Mt. Peeley Trailhead 12/18-19

[Tough_Boots]

Setting up a sign-up sheet for continued search for Joe this coming weekend. It sounds like folks want to coordinate a heavy search of the south side of Mt. Peeley. We'll see what happens with the searchers during the week and also how the weather holds up-- it looks like possible rain at the end of the week. I'll be out there Saturday (weather permitting) and possibly Sunday. Also, if anyone's willing to carpool to the TH that would be awesome. My ride won't make it so I'd love to cram in with someone else. Meet at the TH at 7-ish.

[Tough_Boots]

So pushing through brush will be the theme of the search.

Agreed

I still wonder if more efforts are worthwhile along Joe's anticipated route and previous bail-outs.

Which areas are you thinking?

[Tough_Boots]

Okay so here's the meetup plans:

Saturday morning meet at the TH between 7:30 and 8am. I will be meeting my ride at the turn-off just past the turn onto 201 at 7am if anyone else is looking for a convenient meeting spot (labeled "large parking area for shuttle" on the parking/camping map). If anyone needs a ride down to the TH, put out a call it sounds like some folks have some extra room. Be prepared for 201 to suck if we get rain this week.

[CannondaleKid]

Other ideas:
1. Searching on a parallel on each side of Joe's "Last Chance" track
2. Down off the north side of the trail (on the way up and around Peeley). If Joe had a health problem early on he may have fallen in the steepest areas and it's likely even surviving a fall there, I doubt there'd be cell coverage down there.
3. Bail out well short of his ultimate goal (since he didn't sign register I doubt he got that far to bail down to the south.)

[CannondaleKid]

My Thursday just opened up so I might head back again before Saturday. Forecast now looks like 40% chance of rain Thursday so I might find out first hand how it turns out. If it rains Thursday and clears Friday it might be decent enough to still access the TH without too much trouble... hopefully.

[joebartels]

Might be most beneficial to have predetermined routes for each. Otherwise grouping of unsureness seems to deter plans.

[CannondaleKid]

Agreed 100%!

(As much as I chipped in with other ideas, I'll have no problem being a faithful worker bee and take whatever route I'm deemed worthy of. Just put me in coach!)

[Grasshopper]

by Tough_Boots » Dec 14 2010 12:50 pm

CannondaleKid wrote:So pushing through brush will be the theme of the search.

Agreed

CannondaleKid wrote: I still wonder if more efforts are worthwhile along Joe's anticipated route and previous bail-outs.

Which areas are you thinking?

Tough_Boots, I don't want to complicate your event coordination, but since you ask (and if you decide on 12/18 to allocate some "qualified" resources):
There has not been enough HAZ/AZH individual search effort from the summit of Mount Peeley west to the Sheep Mtn. ridgeline within the area covered in these two 11/16 and 11/23/09 hike routes previously taken by GPSjoe: http://hikearizona.com/location_g.php?QX=213

[CannondaleKid]

I'll volunteer in that area if required.

[Tough_Boots]

There has not been enough HAZ/AZH individual search effort from the summit of Mount Peeley west to the Sheep Mtn. ridgeline within the area covered in these two 11/16 and 11/23/09 hike routes previously taken by GPSjoe: http://hikearizona.com/location_g.php?QX=213

Totally true. My brain is hurting, though

Maybe we should split into areas on Saturday. I'm waiting for a consensus. I'm down with multiple plans out there and not trying to be captain of the ship-- just wanting to keep things organized. We have a lot of folks signed up and we need to use that in the best way possible.

[SUN_HIKER]

Anyone who needs a ride, please PM me. I think the plan is to meet at the TH around 7:30am

[Vaporman]

LoL, sounds like the main issue will be trying to get a bunch of lone wolf adventure hikers into an organized group of effective searchers. I'd jump in and try to coordinate but I'm not a natural leader or experienced enough at coordinating something like this...

[BobP]

Just some of my thoughts with big groups. Make sure everyone knows that they are responsible for themselves. I'm sure you'll naturally break into smaller groups by virtue of varying degrees of knowledge/speed and craziness(not everyone likes painfull bushwacking). I was glad to have mazatzal Richard with me the first time out because he really knows the area well. Everyone has the same goal but not the same level of training and endurance. Be safe...although everyone is responsible for themselves...you also need to look out for each other. Radios are good and you should pick a channel under 15 because some of the older models only go to 14. Also, have a predetermined turnaround time. Good Luck...I'll probably be out there Friday and will update on road conditions.

[SUN_HIKER]

Be safe...although everyone is responsible for themselves...you also need to look out for each other. Radios are good and you should pick a channel under 15 because some of the older models only go to 14. Also, have a predetermined turnaround time. Good Luck...I'll probably be out there Friday and will update on road conditions.

Good advise!
(also based on some previous reports, take some bear spray Just in case? we just may be heading right into the bears den LOL)

[PaleoRob]

But realistically, this many days in, I didn't expect to smell anything. The worst smells from decomposing are usually in the first 4 to 6 days, and even with the cooler weather by now, a month+ later I would hesitate to say we could could expect any.

The earlier scents are from the initial SAR effort - those would be well within the decomp timeline.

[Thoreau]

Just some of my thoughts with big groups. Make sure everyone knows that they are responsible for themselves. I'm sure you'll naturally break into smaller groups by virtue of varying degrees of knowledge/speed and craziness(not everyone likes painfull bushwacking). I was glad to have mazatzal Richard with me the first time out because he really knows the area well. Everyone has the same goal but not the same level of training and endurance. Be safe...although everyone is responsible for themselves...you also need to look out for each other. Radios are good and you should pick a channel under 15 because some of the older models only go to 14. Also, have a predetermined turnaround time. Good Luck...I'll probably be out there Friday and will update on road conditions.

I'm still working on trying to get my on-call duty this weekend swaped so I can get out there, but that side...

On the subject of radio channel, if something below 15 has to be chosen, it would be best if it were from channels 1-7. 1-7 are going to be on even the most basic radio models, but will also transmit at the higher power if they are a newer model. (Channels 8-14 will ONLY transmit at half a watt. On an older radio, 1-7 will also stick to that power level, but the newer models will automatically pump out 1-2 watts, depending on the model.) With those short built-in antennas, any transmit power advantage is gonna be helpful in this kind of terrain. That said, if anyone has spare radios that have al 22 channels, sticking to 15 would be the easiest bet to ensure everyone has as much radio range as possible, and to keep things simple =)

From the main discussion thread, it sounded like there was a suggestion to have some sort of cordination types up on Mt. Peely which would be a very good place for centralized communications. From that spot I was able to talk to people all over the area a few weeks ago.

[CannondaleKid]

Top try to make sense of just what we'd like to search and where, I figured we need to document where we HAVE searched already. So I created a GPS file by entering every GPS track I could find posted on HAZ into one master file, then I took a screenshot to see what the coverage map looked like. The pics are below:

The first is the full search area with the fringe area tracks trimmed.
NOTE: The light yellow track is Joe "Last Chance" route, the Dark Yellow was Joe's April 2010 attempt.

The second covers just the area between and around the smells. I added red X's in areas that don't appear to have been covered and the smells could conceivably originate from there.

FYI, SAR track #'s 1-6 are included as well.

[Vaporman]

Ohh, forgot to mention that I recently bought a pair of GMRS radios and can do whatever channel we decide is best. LoL, I bought that old Motorola Talkabout forever ago back when I was in high school and I think I paid $100 for each one and now I can buy a pair for a fraction of that... ;)

[CannondaleKid]

I just did a search of HAZ and I found no thread on two-way radios so will start one under Gear.
I'm wondering is there any consensus on what works, what's reliable etc.?

I don't want to hijack the thread so if you have any thoughts to share, please head off to the 2-way thread under Gear.
Thanks!

[suzaz]

Lots of good ideas still coming from everyone for search options.
1) Search the ‘smell area
2) Joe’s ’09 bail out area really has not been thoroughly searched in the ravine.
3) Peak#2 area is the one where there is high risk of losing footage-- resulting in a fall.

Got this image today from Gabriele. We thought it would be worth while to toss out for discussion as possible areas of focus for the coming weekend. I suspect there will be a few others showing up to help search that are not HAZ members, best to get our plan flushed out. Fingers crossed that the weather holds out.

Quick question---Hank have you or Gabriele actually been able to review the Sheep Mt. summit log with your own personal eyes? would that be worthwhile?

Was there water in Sheep Creek or was it dry?

What about Joe's file called the "last chance" route? Do we feel that has been significantly covered? Did anyone tackle that large cliffy wall of rocks shown in his pictures? I can't find the place that had the route and the pictures geocoded.

Desertgirl---hiked in my regular hiking clothes--even sleeveless through much of the day, spent a good amount of my time in a manzanita maze and came home without a scratch, bruise or tear. (maybe I was just lucky)

As we consider making a plan for this weekend should we review what we know?
1. His car was found at the Mt. Peeley Trailhead.

[CannondaleKid]

2. If we go by what SAR said about Joe not having signed the summit log ("nothing but dust in the container") it seems likely he did NOT make the summit. (From what I understand, if he did in fact make it, he WOULD have signed it.)