Story of missing hiker in Joshua Tree NP

[Hikin_Jim]

Well, I have a thought. My thoughts aren't necessarily relevant, but here goes:
Bill loves Joshua Tree. He lives where, in Georgia, yes? He doesn't get out nearly as often as he'd like. He's out here on business and arranges for some time in Josh. He crams as much in as possible. "Hey, I'm only out here a couple of times a year if that, I've got to fit it all in" Bill thinks to himself. "Yeah, it's hot, but I'll just have to 'suck it up' and bear with it. I'm tough enough"

As I recall, Bill did have the reputation of being a "hike until you drop" hiker. That works reasonably well if you're hydrated. Not so well if you're overheating and dehydrated. I'm not clear on how much experience Bill had with high heat, dry climate hiking. He may have had a "just tough it out" mentality. My dad, same generation roughly, certainly had that mentality as my experience on many hikes can well attest.

So, why do I mention this? Well, if Bill is trying to cram as much in as possible on one of his all too few Josh trips, then maybe that explains his overly (to our eyes) ambitious plan. And why he'd do Quail Mountain with a late start on a hot day.

Now, even if I'm 100% dead on, does that put us any closer to Bill? No, but perhaps it removes some of the head scratching ("What the heck was he thinking?"). It reduces, in an occam's razor like fashion, to a simple hiking trip. I suspect that Bill's out there somewhere in the Quail - Smith Water area, and the Serin Drive ping only makes that suspicion stronger.

Again, recall the search for Steve Fossett. Fossett was in an airplane for crying out loud, and what is perhaps the most extensive search in the Western US could not find him. A hiker happened upon his effects by chance and traced them back to the wreck. And this near Mammoth Lakes, CA, an extremely popular hiking destination. Just try to get a permit for the "Minaret Loop". They're relatively hard to get. They're not as hard as Whitney or the JMT, buy you have to plan well in advance. So, an intensive search for a famous man with extremely wealthy friends in a well travelled area could not find an airplane crash. There is therefore every reason to believe that Bill is still out there. The fact that he has not yet been found indicates not at all that he is elsewhere. The terrain is just too rough and rugged to rule out Bill's presence based on the searching to date.

I remember some Air Force general stating that there just had to be some kind of conspiracy behind Fossett's disappearance. There was just no way that such an extensive search could not find him. And then he turned up, crashed in the plane he had taken off in, in a place where it was evident that the most straightforward explanation was in fact correct. In like manner, I believe Bill is out there.

HJ

[Ric Capucho]

One point that keeps popping up is that Bill knew JTNP well, and was no stranger to the park, the terrain, the landmarks. That always nagged me, until I figured out why; according to the Police Narrative upon opening up Bill's rental car the officer states: "I picked up the receipt-sized note which I'd thought was an itinerary. The note was not an itinerary; however, it had directions from the west entrance of the park to the Juniper Flats parking area". The scan of the directions attached to the Police Narrative is unreadable due to poor resolution, but at least confirms that it's handwritten.

1. If Bill knew JTNP so very well then why does he need directions from the west entrance along the Park Road (erm, the only road), turning right towards Key's View (the only other road), and then to stop when he sees the JF parking area on the right? I don't think I'd personally need or want such directions even though I've never been within a thousand miles of JTNP. That's a bit odd.

2. Where did he get the directions from that were then handwritten out? Someone at the west entrance itself? Or someone at the Yucca Valley store where he bought the water and other supplies? That's also a bit odd, as someone knowledgable enough to give directions to JF parking is surely clued up enough to recognise "Missing Bill" during the hullabaloo during his disappearance. Bill has a distinctive face, and not only because he's "our Bill", and his case is interesting enough to generate 40 pages on this thread; Bill has/had a memorable face anyway. So why didn't the directee come forward? Or maybe he/she did, and that's why the Police found the link to the purchases at the store? Or were the directions written out on the back of the store receipt? There's not the even faintest hint of foul play coming from me, by the way. But it's also a bit odd.

3. With directions to the JF parking area, after an early start (waking up from an Eastern Time sleep to a Pacific Time morning, three hours earlier than his body clock was telling him) making a call to his condo-loaning friend at 7am and another at 8am to Mary, so why did he arrive so very late in the day, certainly later than 10:30am or so? As Tom et al have noted on numerous occasions, that's a bit odd.

4. If he detoured to Lost Horse (I'm a big fan of that theory, by the way) then why does he suddenly have the local knowledge that the LH parking area is only a hop-skip-and-jump further down the Key's View Road from the JF parking area that he has directions for? Does he know the area or not? That's bit odd too.

I have no conclusions, other than food for thought by more thoughtful people than myself. Richard may well state that the oddness stems from early indications of the coming "mental event", and I'm more than half convinced myself.

Ric

[drndr]

My dark conspiracy theory would have Bill robbed and murdered no where near where his car was found. I still don't like that the rangers called the number of the guy he told his friend he was meeting. That guy said he never heard of him. Rangers and a volunteer drove by the parking lot and said his car wasn't there. At one point his car was there, then gone, and then back. This claimed by two witnesses I think.


I think he went hiking with this mystery guy early or more likely by himself and then met mystery guy later. They left the park where he was robbed and killed. Guilty parties decide to confuse search for him by returning car to hike location. The directions were left by one of party who didnt know where back country lot was. The last ping heard was probably in the opposite direction of where we think he is. 10 Miles north of Yucca Valley while they were disposing of the phone when they realized there was a search on.

I have to admit I didn't go back and read all the details again of the disappearance. Just going off memory. And I don't really believe this but figured probably as good idea as others.

Dan

[Pitownpi]

My dark conspiracy theory has Bill in Thailand.....quite happy and alive
yer on the wrong trail!
...follow the money trail!

[RichardK]

Having just moved from Southern California to south Florida, I may have some insight on Bill's experience in hot weather hiking. It was said that Bill was experienced in hiking in Georgia's summer heat. That is why he was not intimidated by the prospect of hiking in JT's summer heat. However, there is a big difference. Right now, the humidity in Marietta is 54% while in Joshua Tree it is 8%. I don't know if Bill understood just how quickly dehydration kills in high temperature, low humidity situations. People who don't live in or spend time in deserts usually don't. In the humid South, you don't lose water through respiration nearly as fast. The two bottles of water Bill purchased were nowhere near enough for those hikes. Bill likely felt thirst, but ignored it, not understanding that this was the first symptom of life threatening dehydration. He just dismissed it and, being "a bull of a man", pushed on to complete his hikes. Unfortunately, he pushed it too hard and dehydration led to mental confusion. Bill wandered and expired either out of sight or in a remote, seldom visited part of the park.

[Ric Capucho]

Having just moved from Southern California to south Florida, I may have some insight on Bill's experience in hot weather hiking. It was said that Bill was experienced in hiking in Georgia's summer heat. That is why he was not intimidated by the prospect of hiking in JT's summer heat. However, there is a big difference. Right now, the humidity in Marietta is 54% while in Joshua Tree it is 8%. I don't know if Bill understood just how quickly dehydration kills in high temperature, low humidity situations. People who don't live in or spend time in deserts usually don't. In the humid South, you don't lose water through respiration nearly as fast. The two bottles of water Bill purchased were nowhere near enough for those hikes. Bill likely felt thirst, but ignored it, not understanding that this was the first symptom of life threatening dehydration. He just dismissed it and, being "a bull of a man", pushed on to complete his hikes. Unfortunately, he pushed it too hard and dehydration led to mental confusion. Bill wandered and expired either out of sight or in a remote, seldom visited part of the park.

What Richard said.

Ric

[Ric Capucho]

Folks, a post from Adam Marsland who's had technical problems registering on this forum, but this flurry of interest has stirred him to write. He just emailed me asking me if I'd help him getting his views across. And of course he deserves that as he has many a foot print across JTNP searching for Bill. So, copy and paste of his email moments ago.

Adam Marsland here. Long time lurker, first time poster. I've asked Ric Capucho to post on my behalf since the board doesn't seem to want to let me register.

Been following the recent posts with interest. I smiled at seeing the word "conspiracy" thrown around as I know that's partially directed at me. It's true I no longer believe Bill is to be found in the park, but it's not simply because we haven't found him - it's absolutely true that any of us could have walked right past him (though his clothing and pack should be conspicuous). That's not the point. Taking all the information together, including his initial disappearance, the geography and topography, the location and timing of the ping, and what I've seen myself on the ground, I just cannot make a lost hiker scenario fit the facts as I now understand them - at least not without squinting and doing some serious pretzel motions. And as some outdated pages on my website will attest, I sure have tried!

Now, Occam's Razor does not mean the simplest explanation should be presumed right. It just means it should be tested first; and that's what's been done. Tom and others still believe the lost hiker scenario is far more likely than another explanation, which is totally fair. I've weighed the same evidence and come to a different conclusion, for now -- new information may change my thinking just as it has in the past, and I can't prove anything (nor do I care to). No one wants to be the first person to go with an idea that seems kooky, and this is a hiking/S & R board, so I get the resistance to another explanation. But if there's an alternate scenario where all the facts line up straight and make sense, I will lean toward that, even if it doesn't jibe with conventional wisdom. If new facts come in, then that may change the picture yet again. It's a process.

At any rate, that wasn't my reason for coming on here. Bottom line is I could easily be wrong (and if I'm right there's not much to talk about) and no one knows for sure what happened. A number of folks have recently posted with new ideas and asked for suggestions about where to look. I wanted to contribute and add a few bits of information.

RichardK - your idea of Bill wandering around in a fog up California Riding and Hiking Trail makes perfect sense - that had occurred to me too. It makes less sense to have him turn into Upper Covington, but I suppose it's possible. But I can't see any possible way that he then wandered into the badlands west of there in that condition. I've gone all up and down the west side of Upper Covington looking for easy ways in and there just aren't any. On the very few semi-OK entry points I soon encountered pathways that were so choked with brush and rockfall that I had to turn back. No way a dazed semi-conscious hiker just wanders in there absent-mindedly. It's just not possible; you'd fall on your head almost immediately. If Bill did get into the badlands, he had to have been somewhat ambulatory and conscious enough to have gotten over some real obstacles (but crazy enough to enter in the first place). I think Tom would also vouch for that - he's gotten further into that hellhole than I have. Now once you're down at the bottom, there's a honking big canyon wash that runs all the way to Sky Valley and that'd probably make an interesting trek if someone wanted to try it. Early on I thought that's where Bill went, but after checking out the approaches I changed my mind pretty fast.

Hikin' Jim, for a while I was thinking much as you do - that Bill was trying to cram in as much hiking time as possible while he was there and went too far. However, Bill's fiancé was kind enough to share some information and according to her, Bill was going to be in JTNP all week, and was planning to do a series of short hikes. So he didn't actually need to make a big hike happen that one day. Bill would have been on his second hike of the day, most likely having gone to Lost Horse first, as Tom already indicated.

So if we exclude those wacko conspiracy theories, in terms of where to look, I basically agree with Tom and Myth -- between Quail Mountain and Smith Water Canyon. (In response to the question about a map, I did map out the known possible ping spots here: http://www.adammarsland.com/ewasko3.html)

The way the current cell info appears, there seems to be (to me) only two plausible places for the ping to have occurred - on the extreme west end of Upper Covington (Tom is skeptical that this is a Serin tower area, but I am pretty confident about it), or one low ridge area on the south side of Smith Water Canyon at approximately 34° 2'5.20"N, 116°15'47.32"W.

Both Tom and I visited this latter spot within a day of each other, and it has a lot going for it: it is the only place along SWC close enough to the 10.6 mile line (and to Smith Water) to seemingly be in the running, and it is an area with strong reception which lies just north of a low ridge; in other words, it's conceivable that Bill could have been in a dark cell zone up to this point, crossed over the ridge, suddenly came into a strong reception area and crashed the battery (one of the puzzles with the cell ping being on the south side of SWC is how Bill got there without pinging earlier, since there's a lot of reception between there and Quail Mountain; also why the cell only connected for only 10 seconds). I call this the "magic bullet" spot.

There are a number of nagging problems with this scenario but let's just go with it.

Now, from this vantage, Bill can easily see Yucca Valley, and he may be able to see Park Road. So the way out from there - north or east - is clear to him. If he did ping the phone here, I would guess one of two things happened:

1. He tried to climb down to the east, towards and above Quail Springs (the north descent into SWC has been thoroughly covered by searchers, including me, and I don't think he's there). The descent towards Quail Springs looks easy but gets progressively worse as you go along, and it's easy to imagine cliffing out - I've nearly done it a few times. This area sucks. It's been looked at a lot both physically and through binoculars and photos, but I'm sure there's a few spots no one's gotten to. I know the times I've been through I was more focused on not breaking my neck. It would be great to swarm that small sector if it wasn't so darn dangerous.

2. There was apparently a search helicopter above Quail Mountain at around 9 a.m. Sunday morning, roughly 2 1/2 hours after the ping. If Bill was still in the ping area (and it's a nice place to hang out and wait for help), he have may seen the helicopter and backtracked south towards it, explaining why he wasn't found where the phone presumably pinged. Ric Capucho first suggested this scenario, and it still makes logical sense. This area has not been searched as much as the area around the 10.6 radius.

If I was going to go back, those are the places I would look. The timeline, distances, cell reception patterns and topography still make it hard to understand, but if Bill was eventually found in one of these areas I wouldn't die of shock.

Any place else just bristles with too many improbabilities to me. Upper Covington looked promising, but he just doesn't seem to be there and unlike SWC, the terrain in UC is pretty benign until you get into the badlands, and given that he should have seen Eureka Peak Road on the way in I have a very hard time believing he would have risked it. There is a spot both Myth and I looked at between Upper and Lower Covington, but it's so close to the road and UC trailhead, and just high and far enough to make me skeptical he would have gone up there to get a call out or to cool off - and a ranger was in the area very shortly after the phone went off. Plus we looked and didn't find him.

Hope this contributes to the conversation...it's a fascinating mystery.


Adam Marsland

[Ric Capucho]

(Cough) Today's the 24th of June. Reminds me of a certain date. (Cough, cough).

Ric

[RichardK]

Adam - Thank you for your comments and for the searches that you made. Both are appreciated. Also, I imagine that Bill's family and friends may be reading this thread. I hope that they do not interpret our 40 pages of speculation as being disrespectful of Bill. Like Bill, we are all hikers here. We like to watch each other's backs. We want to know what fate befell Bill nearly as much as you do. Our seemingly endless speculation is, in part, an expression of our frustration that Bill has not been found in spite of extensive searching by both authorities and selfless volunteers.

The tough nut to crack in this case is how do you get Bill from his apparent goal of Quail Mountain to the 10.6 mile ping arc? With all due respect to Tom, I just cannot accept that a thirsty Bill decided to hike 2 miles further away from his car to a canyon that, according to posts in this thread, has no potable water. The only scenario that makes sense to me is that he lost it mentally and wandered. Wandered to where, who knows. Of course, if Verizon's system made a mistake, then we have all been chasing rainbows.

[Perry]

Folks, a post from Adam Marsland who's had technical problems registering on this forum

He can send me an email if he's still having difficulties: contact at mtsanjacinto.info

The answer to the anti-spam question is "highway 111", "hwy 111" or just "111". First post has to be approved by moderators as an extra step to keep out ambitious organic spammers (real people hired in other countries to post links and ads). After that, you can post normally every time.