WA WA - Samantha Sayers, 28, Vesper Peak, North Cascades, 1 August 2018

[kgreg2529]

Wow! That's great that you donate your profits to such a good cause. At $10,000 a dog, I can see why some groups would be hesitant to self-deploy even more. Losing or having a dog injured is obviously a great expense, and one that many groups may not be able to take on. It explains why the mother has mostly attracted individual dogs rather than SAR groups to help her at the current moment.

My husband said the K9s and SAR they use with his department come from Holland and can cost the department upwards of $50k fully trained so, yeah, I can definitely see why they wouldn’t want their dogs out for weeks on end in dangerous terrain like that.

 

[UltraViolet4545]

Another tough thing about working dogs— you don’t know if a dog has the right intensity & drive until it’s several months to a year or so old. You can’t just start training an 8 week old puppy and expect it will turn out to be a search dog as an adult. This is not something you can “train” into a dog, but rather the dog has to be born with these specific qualities (intense, toy driven, stamina, etc). In turn, these qualities that make for a top notch working dog also make the dog *extremely* difficult (almost impossible really) to live in the house as a “pet.” Most of them are go go go and need tons of physical and mental activity to keep them from getting destructive.

 

[ChelaKitty]

Wow! That's great that you donate your profits to such a good cause. At $10,000 a dog, I can see why some groups would be hesitant to self-deploy even more. Losing or having a dog injured is obviously a great expense, and one that many groups may not be able to take on. It explains why the mother has mostly attracted individual dogs rather than SAR groups to help her at the current moment.

Agree! Snohomish County, where I live, put TONS of resources into an epic three week rescue operation for Sam. One day they had 14 dog/handler teams on the mountain. They did so much for Sam. Tried so hard. If other teams do not wish to go without LE sending them I get that. It’s been done. Sams mom (understandably) does not want to give up. So sad.

 

[kgreg2529]

Agree! Snohomish County, where I live, put TONS of resources into an epic three week rescue operation for Sam. One day they had 14 dog/handler teams on the mountain. They did so much for Sam. Tried so hard. If other teams do not wish to go without LE sending them I get that. It’s been done. Sams mom (understandably) does not want to give up. So sad.

I heard her mom say in a video (I think) that the department never had more than four at a time. I didn’t think that sounded right!

 

[Phantasma2624]

I heard her mom say in a video (I think) that the department never had more than four at a time. I didn’t think that sounded right!

She said that she didn’t see more than four dogs while she was there. I thought, when she said that, that that would make sense to me because most of them would be in the mountain. To be fair to her, she said that she could be wrong, but their most recent videos make me wonder if in her grief, she is starting to turn some anger toward law enforcement for “not doing a good enough job”, even though they placed a vast amount of time and resources into their search.

She also said in a previous video that air searches were less effective and blamed the police for not having enough dogs, because dogs would be more accurate. I don’t think she understands completely why law enforcement can’t just grab whatever SAR dog they want.

It probably doesn’t help that all these psychics are telling her that she needs dogs to find her daughter. Since she’s only choosing to believe he ones that give good news (Sam’s alive), I’m sure that this has her focused heavily on SAR dogs.

 

[ChelaKitty]

Here’s the post about the 14 SAR dogs, and a screenshot in case you don’t have Facebook. As I understand it, some teams were helicoptered in due to terrain. This was no small operation. I believe this has been the costliest SAR in our county’s history, if the not the whole state of Washington.

Snohomish County Volunteer Search & Rescue

 

[MsFacetious]

Even missing children searches I've watched haven't gotten this type of search.
Garrett Bardsley's search was called off after 9 days. I remember that being difficult to stomach at the time. 14 years later it still haunts me that we never found him.

However watching them continue searching for Sam for 3x's longer... and still be criticized? Wow. So many missing people's families would give anything to have 1/10 of the help they have had!

 

[North American Blue Jay]

Unless she dropped it and it broke. I know they are tougher now, but if it falls down a mountain cliff into water or snow, it's pretty much useless.

Good point about the phone breaking. I don't think they could ping the phone if it were broken or underwater. That seems to make it more likely that the phone stayed with her if she fell - in which case, her body protects the phone from impact and minimally, she is too incapacitated to use it even though it's initially still working for another day or so.

Another possible scenario ... as she falls, she drops the phone more locally? Or it doesn't fall that far?

There are a number of articles about people falling off cliffs taking selfies. But I'm guessing, in these cases, the phone usually goes down too, flying off in another direction, meaning, not a selfie accident. But you'd have to look into these stories.

I suppose, too, if the phone more or less slides down an slope and is stopped by a bush, for example, it would still work.

If she's scrambling around, I could see her dropping a phone in an area she can't reach. One hiker who went up Sperry (in an unrelated post) described dropping his camera in a crevice and he was only able to retrieve it with his ice axe.

So ... she could fall trying to retrieve a dropped phone/camera.

 

[Suglo]

Even missing children searches I've watched haven't gotten this type of search.
Garrett Bardsley's search was called off after 9 days. I remember that being difficult to stomach at the time. 14 years later it still haunts me that we never found him.

However watching them continue searching for Sam for 3x's longer... and still be criticized? Wow. So many missing people's families would give anything to have 1/10 of the help they have had!

So true. They had three weeks of official searches which is unheard of. I wonder what happened to the SAR dogs picking up her scent a couple of times and I wonder where that was. I also heard they found blood on a rock. Sure would be interesting to see if those things all happened in a general vicinity. I don’t have much hope that she’s alive. It’s been over 31 days. She wasn’t dressed for the elements. It’s been downright cold up there. 48 high with 31 low yesterday. I hope they find her before really bad weather sets in and it starts to cover the mountain with snow again.

 

[Suglo]

Everyone is mentioning her phone and pings. I read a blog the other day about a climber who was seriously injured climbing the face of the peak and had to be rescued by helicopter. Her sister, who was with her, had to climb all the way to the top of the peak to get a signal to call 911. There were other hikers up there and none of them could get a signal other than the sister because she was the only one who has Verizon. They said it was the only carrier who could connect at the very top. This was a couple of years ago so I guess there may be improved cell coverage now.

 

[UltraViolet4545]

My understanding regarding her phone and it’s pinging was that all activity/pings stopped the afternoon Sam disappeared. I saw a few times that they pinged her phone for a day or two afterwards, but the way I took it— they didn’t actually gain any information.

It would be like saying “I called her for 2 days” after she went missing. You could call a phone that’s been run over by a semi all you want, but nobody will answer and the call won’t reach anyone. Just like you could ping a phone that’s been dropped off a mountain, but you won’t actually get any information coming from the phone.

That’s just how I understood this.

 

[Suglo]

My understanding regarding her phone and it’s pinging was that all activity/pings stopped the afternoon Sam disappeared. I saw a few times that they pinged her phone for a day or two afterwards, but the way I took it— they didn’t actually gain any information.

It would be like saying “I called her for 2 days” after she went missing. You could call a phone that’s been run over by a semi all you want, but nobody will answer and the call won’t reach anyone. Just like you could ping a phone that’s been dropped off a mountain, but you won’t actually get any information coming from the phone.

That’s just how I understood this.

Early on, I read a couple of comments on the Find Sam FB page that her phone had pinged on August 3rd, two days after disappearing, which is why they assumed she was alive and on the move. I never saw any official proof of that or it noted on any of the multiple maps that were posted. I really don’t know what the official timeline is because they have maps stating she started her hike at 8:00 am and others that state that she started at 9:50 am. They also fluctuate between the noon summit and the 3:00 pm summit. I wish they would do an official updated map with what they know to be true and not what they assume.

 

[zecats]

Early on, I read a couple of comments on the Find Sam FB page that her phone had pinged on August 3rd, two days after disappearing, which is why they assumed she was alive and on the move. I never saw any official proof of that or it noted on any of the multiple maps that were posted. I really don’t know what the official timeline is because they have maps stating she started her hike at 8:00 am and others that state that she started at 9:50 am. They also fluctuate between the noon summit and the 3:00 pm summit. I wish they would do an official updated map with what they know to be true and not what they assume.

I saw a map with the location of the pings and I remember one being near the snow covered area where she was seen in the video. At least I believe it was the same area. Hard to tell unless you know the area or are actually up there looking at it. And the timing is too much to be coincidence that the phone was pinging around the same time she could have slipped and fallen up there. Phone could still work long after she fell for sure, so perhaps that explains a later ping. I haven’t read anything about that though. The map is in this thread back a week or so.

 

[Suglo]

I saw a map with the location of the pings and I remember one being near the snow covered area where she was seen in the video. At least I believe it was the same area. Hard to tell unless you know the area or are actually up there looking at it. And the timing is too much to be coincidence that the phone was pinging around the same time she could have slipped and fallen up there. Phone could still work long after she fell for sure, so perhaps that explains a later ping. I haven’t read anything about that though. The map is in this thread back a week or so.

I saw that too which is why I asked a week or two ago if she could have been caught up in an avalanche and be buried under the snow. I really hope they find her soon.

 

[zecats]

I saw that too which is why I asked a week or two ago if she could have been caught up in an avalanche and be buried under the snow. I really hope they find her soon.

I remember your previous post about that. Avalanche, rock slide, or a slip and uncontrollable slide down are my top conclusions. Jmo. And that area is ground zero. Jmo.

 

[Suglo]

I remember your previous post about that. Avalanche, rock slide, or a slip and uncontrollable slide down are my top conclusions. Jmo. And that area is ground zero. Jmo.

I agree. I know it’s dangerous terrain but they should be focusing there before searching at Spada Lake or other peaks which were not on her itinerary. I’m convinced she’s in that area also.

 

[Phantasma2624]

Comments have been snipped to respond to certain points.

I wonder what happened to the SAR dogs picking up her scent a couple of times and I wonder where that was. I also heard they found blood on a rock.

The dog was an air scent dog, which is a dog that is trained to pick up human scents. The mother mentioned that this means that they are not trained to find a particular scent, but rather ANY human scent. They sent technical climbers and helicopters in to look in that area, but nothing was found.

The blood on the rock likely belonged to a member of the boy scout troop that was injured. They mentioned that the group had to terminate their hike early because a member was injured in that vicinity.

My understanding regarding her phone and it’s pinging was that all activity/pings stopped the afternoon Sam disappeared. I saw a few times that they pinged her phone for a day or two afterwards, but the way I took it— they didn’t actually gain any information.

Yes, this is how I took it as well. I think they were pinging her phone, but I'm not sure if they actually got a phone response. It would seem to me that that would have been a big lead that we would have heard about or seen on the maps.

Early on, I read a couple of comments on the Find Sam FB page that her phone had pinged on August 3rd, two days after disappearing, which is why they assumed she was alive and on the move. I never saw any official proof of that or it noted on any of the multiple maps that were posted. I really don’t know what the official timeline is because they have maps stating she started her hike at 8:00 am and others that state that she started at 9:50 am. They also fluctuate between the noon summit and the 3:00 pm summit. I wish they would do an official updated map with what they know to be true and not what they assume.

I really don't think that the phone was active after the day of her disappearance. I think the "movement" that they were describing are the two pings on their maps (MAPS | Find Sam Sayers). Given that these pings happened in fairly quick succession, it would give the appearance of movement. However, if these are two cell phone tower pings, it might not matter. Those towers would be so close that it's likely their coverage areas overlap.

I also find it frustrating to follow their timeline, especially since they haven't included all of the information. I think that this is confusing people. For example, did the witness see her at noon or at 3:00? If the witness saw her at noon, how is she videotaped approaching the summit at 1:30? And this is not just my assumption, this is what the family's maps say. I am taking any information that the family has posted on their website (or anything that the sheriff's office has posted) as official, and mostly ignoring media reports, since they've had some unreliable information. This is why I think the witness actually saw her around 3:00, not noon, which was the second statement by the police department, and what the family has said.

However, if that's true, then why do the pings have her moving away from the summit between 13:44 and 14:10 hrs? This would seemingly be in the wrong direction, if i fact these pings represent movement. This is why I'm almost inclined to think that they do NOT represent movement at all, or as previously indicated, they happened on another day (although I doubt this for the reasons said above). If she were at the summit, her phone could have pinged once off of tower one and then again off tower two, which would be further away, all without her moving. They aren't GPS coordinates from an app or anything, so we can likely safely assume that they are pinging from a tower. This is true even if the military was the one pinging it. They would ping it through a cell phone tower.

So ... she could fall trying to retrieve a dropped phone/camera.

I hadn't thought of that! I could definitely imagine this happening. She might go to take a picture or a selfie, drop the phone, and then try to get it. This could explain the damaged phone and/or why she would have gone "off the trail" so to speak. But, please correct me if I am wrong, if she did have to climb down to get it, would she leave her hiking poles behind somewhere? It would seem that they would be in the way if you were trying to reach or climb to a phone.

 

[zecats]

L

Comments have been snipped to respond to certain points.


The dog was an air scent dog, which is a dog that is trained to pick up human scents. The mother mentioned that this means that they are not trained to find a particular scent, but rather ANY human scent. They sent technical climbers and helicopters in to look in that area, but nothing was found.

The blood on the rock likely belonged to a member of the boy scout troop that was injured. They mentioned that the group had to terminate their hike early because a member was injured in that vicinity.




Yes, this is how I took it as well. I think they were pinging her phone, but I'm not sure if they actually got a phone response. It would seem to me that that would have been a big lead that we would have heard about or seen on the maps.



I really don't think that the phone was active after the day of her disappearance. I think the "movement" that they were describing are the two pings on their maps (MAPS | Find Sam Sayers). Given that these pings happened in fairly quick succession, it would give the appearance of movement. However, if these are two cell phone tower pings, it might not matter. Those towers would be so close that it's likely their coverage areas overlap.

I also find it frustrating to follow their timeline, especially since they haven't included all of the information. I think that this is confusing people. For example, did the witness see her at noon or at 3:00? If the witness saw her at noon, how is she videotaped approaching the summit at 1:30? And this is not just my assumption, this is what the family's maps say. I am taking any information that the family has posted on their website (or anything that the sheriff's office has posted) as official, and mostly ignoring media reports, since they've had some unreliable information. This is why I think the witness actually saw her around 3:00, not noon, which was the second statement by the police department, and what the family has said.

However, if that's true, then why do the pings have her moving away from the summit between 13:44 and 14:10 hrs? This would seemingly be in the wrong direction, if i fact these pings represent movement. This is why I'm almost inclined to think that they do NOT represent movement at all, or as previously indicated, they happened on another day (although I doubt this for the reasons said above). If she were at the summit, her phone could have pinged once off of tower one and then again off tower two, which would be further away, all without her moving. They aren't GPS coordinates from an app or anything, so we can likely safely assume that they are pinging from a tower. This is true even if the military was the one pinging it. They would ping it through a cell phone tower.



I hadn't thought of that! I could definitely imagine this happening. She might go to take a picture or a selfie, drop the phone, and then try to get it. This could explain the damaged phone and/or why she would have gone "off the trail" so to speak. But, please correct me if I am wrong, if she did have to climb down to get it, would she leave her hiking poles behind somewhere? It would seem that they would be in the way if you were trying to reach or climb to a phone.

As I understand it, the video at 1:30 was after she summited Vesper and was on the saddle area between Vesper and Sperry. Makes more sense to have her spotted at noon on Vesper and then she decided to explore a bit before going back down. If she did indeed summit at noon she then had ample time to check down the other side and in the area where the snow climb is taped. IMO she summitted at noon, had lunch and/ or a rest, then explored around a bit before having to descend by 3:00 to make it back by 6:00pm. She fell before getting the chance to go back down. Jmo.

 

[Phantasma2624]

L

As I understand it, the video at 1:30 was after she summited Vesper and was on the saddle area between Vesper and Sperry. Makes more sense to have her spotted at noon on Vesper and then she decided to explore a bit before going back down. If she did indeed summit at noon she then had ample time to check down the other side and in the area where the snow climb is taped. IMO she summitted at noon, had lunch and/ or a rest, then explored around a bit before having to descend by 3:00 to make it back by 6:00pm. She fell before getting the chance to go back down. Jmo.

But the maps make it appear that she was videotaped approaching the summit of Vesper Peak. The maps (again from the family MAPS | Find Sam Sayers) show that this was clearly on the trail to Vesper, and not in the area between Vesper and Sperry. It's also clearly on the original trail line that the family has drawn (it's in yellow). That being said, I don't know this area or these trails well. It the point on the map is on the trail between Vesper and Sperry, I would have to take someone's word for it.

 

[zecats]

But the maps make it appear that she was videotaped approaching the summit of Vesper Peak. The maps (again from the family MAPS | Find Sam Sayers) show that this was clearly on the trail to Vesper, and not in the area between Vesper and Sperry. It's also clearly on the original trail line that the family has drawn (it's in yellow). That being said, I don't know this area or these trails well. It the point on the map is on the trail between Vesper and Sperry, I would have to take someone's word for it.

It’s the perspective of the person who taped it I believe. And @North American Blue Jay That’s the poster where I first saw the video. Sam was following behind another couple where one had fallen and was reaching out to the person in front. Again these are just my thoughts and I see where the confusion comes from.