Missing Hunters Found Searchers Found Tracks In Snow; Men Out Two Nights

Two hunters missing north of Priest Lake for two days were found by searchers Saturday afternoon.

The break in the search came at about noon, when searchers on four-wheelers found tracks in the snow along Cedar Creek, roughly 22 miles north of Nordman, Idaho.

At 2 p.m., the men were found unharmed, walking along a ridge above Cedar Creek.

Jeffrey E. Gedeon, 34, and Eddy H. Easley, 30, year-round residents of Priest Lake, spent two nights in the snow-covered woods after losing their way during a Thanksgiving hunt.

They were unavailable for comment Saturday afternoon.

“They looked in pretty good shape when they came out - a little cold and hungry,” said Doug Cook, a friend who helped with the search. “They had fires, and they had a little bit of food they rationed out.”

Their disappearance befuddled and worried friends and acquaintances, who know Gedeon and Easley as well-prepared, knowledgeable outdoorsmen.

On Friday, after one night out, some folks weren’t too concerned, said Linda Lubig, a friend who works at the Priest Lake Exxon station’s Little Store. They knew the two men had at least one pack of gear and cigarette lighters with them.

“As of yesterday, everybody was saying, `Oh, they’ll come out,”’ Lubig said Saturday morning. “After it started to get dark, they started to panic.”

Searchers were buoyed by the discovery of the tracks in the Cedar Creek drainage, particularly because a winter storm watch was issued by the National Weather Service for Saturday night.

In the past two days, searchers had no answer to their periodic gunfire checks. Search dogs couldn’t find the men’s scent.

Priest Lake ambulance volunteers Julie Daggett and Vern Melvin were warming themselves by a fire in the road when they heard the news of the tracks. One search coordinator asked them to sound their siren to help the missing hunters orient themselves.

“I think it’s a good sign,” Daggett said, as the siren wailed into the wilderness. “They’re doing all this because we haven’t had any leads for so long.”

A bloodhound howled from a truck driving by slowly.

“Go get ‘em, boy,” Daggett told the dog.

Bonner County Deputy Joe Young, who’d had only two hours of sleep since the official search started early Friday, was cautiously optimistic when the word came by radio that tracks had been found.

“Everything we’ve found so far has either been searchers or other hunters,” he said.

To reduce the chance of confusion, the Trapper Creek road and surrounding area was closed to hunters, and authorities were limiting the number of searchers combing the woods, he said.

When they found tracks near Cedar Creek, however, Boundary County Sheriff Greg Sprungl said they had reason to believe they belonged to Gedeon and Easley.

The tracks went up a steep slope, toward where the hunters’ pickup was parked.

“This is not a hill a hunter is going to take on,” Sprungl said, pointing at the tight contour lines on his topographic map. “This is all very steep.”

Gedeon had hunted the area for the past few weekends, according to friends. On Thanksgiving, he and Easley were hunting the Ruby Creek area with plans to meet up with friends near a snowmobile warming hut near Mollies Peak in the late afternoon.

When they didn’t show up, the friends looked for them into the evening. In the early evening, they called the Bonner County Sheriff’s Department for help.

The search party Friday and Saturday included a number of Priest Lake residents, while others clamored to help. The two are well-known and well-liked in the small community. Gedeon operates a small log-home construction company, where Easley works.

Brothers Gary and Ray Nelson grew up with Gedeon. They weren’t allowed to search the woods, but they were encouraged to drive the surrounding roads, in case the men made it to a road.

“There’s been a group of us who hang out together, and Jeff’s one of them,” Ray Nelson said. “We were in a bar one night having a beer and someone asked if we were all related. We said yes, and Jeff’s the oldest.”

Coordinated by the Boundary County Sheriff’s Department, the search involved volunteers with the Boundary and Bonner county search and rescue organizations, Priest Lake Ambulance, the U.S. Forest Service, sheriff’s deputies from both departments, dog and tracking teams, as well as helicopters on standby from Shawn Montee Logging and Fairchild Air Force Base.

About 35 to 40 people were involved in the search.

The helicopters were never used, however, because of fog.