Father, Son Survive Night In The Woods Stranded Cda Hunters Eventually Hike Five Miles To Safety

A Coeur d’Alene plumber and his son spent Saturday night huddled in a pickup after it slid off a backcountry road during an afternoon hunting trip.

Nearly two dozen volunteers and Kootenai County sheriff’s deputies scoured the woods above Fernan Lake through the night without finding Michael Morehead and his 6-year-old son, Joshua.

But after a fitful rest, father and son rose at dawn, hiked several miles to Interstate 90 and hitched a ride home.

“They were wet, cold and tired, but safe,” said Lt. Skip Rapp.

The pair had left home at 1:30 p.m. Saturday, hoping to kill a deer on the season’s last weekend. They were expected home by dark.

They didn’t get a deer, and while heading home at 5 p.m., their truck got stuck on a logging road five miles from I-90 south of Fourth of July Pass.

“I spent until 11 p.m. trying to get it out and making it worse,” Morehead said.

He then joined Joshua, who was sitting in the cab with the engine running and the heater blasting. Dad quickly realized something was wrong.

“I could smell the exhaust; it was hitting me in the face, and I couldn’t breathe,” Morehead said. “I told my son we had to shut it off. He was a trouper. He maintained.”

Twenty minutes later, Morehead tried restarting the truck to warm it up. The battery seemed dead.

Snow began to fall.

Hours of digging and scraping had left his feet soaked and his jeans frozen to a crisp. Morehead was worried about frostbite.

Though he had planned to be gone only a few hours, Morehead had an extra pair of pants. He changed into them and “wrapped my feet up in my coat.”

“At least it was dry,” he said.

Father and son shivered together until 1 a.m. when Joshua urged Morehead to crank the motor again. The engine started, and they slept with the heater on and a window cracked until dawn.

Then the pair hiked to the highway, where they were picked up by the second driver who passed.

“Our legs were sore and my son wasn’t happy, but we made it OK,” Morehead said.

, DataTimes