", Mahood added: "While we now know the conclusion, we may likely never know any detailsunless Bill left behind any surviving notes as to his predicament.". It is possible he was waved through without scanning. Unfortunately, there were at least two things Bill didnt know about this route. First, its a lot rougher than it looks, with much rock hopping involved. Mara Rodriguez of the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department said theSpecialized Investigations Division recovered human remains and the investigation is ongoing. Taking out his cell phone and powering it up to call for help, he would have found no service. In Summer, Ive only seen water in the westerly grove, above the dry waterfall. ", "I always said, he'll eventually befound in someplace no one ever thought he would be," said Mahood via email. He spent the night at a friends vacant condominium before driving to Joshua Tree on the following day, June 24. Melson drove to Joshua Tree in-person to explore Covington Flats, one of several possible sites where Ewaskos ping might have originated. Locating the car confirmed that Bill was inside the park and searchers relocated to Juniper Flats and explored areas including the top of Quail Mountain and south to Keys View. A helicopter was used to search for Doggett by air and located himon rocky terrain. His goal was to learn if the pings suggested 10.6-mile radius could have been accurate. In late January, a hiker diedafter an apparent fall on rocky and remote terrain near Idyllwild. The light blue line is the 10.6 mile radius from the Serin Drive cell tower. I think what a man of Bills reported determination may have attempted in his last hours could have a great deal to do with why hes not been yet found. Mike Melson became interested in the disappearance in the spring of 2012. Frankly, Id much prefer someone other than I find Bill, and if laying my thoughts out here makes that happen, then great! However, an informal group of sleuths continued to look for Ewasko over the years. Or the subject heads in an unexpected direction for reasons unknown to the searchers. Due to that amount of search coverage completed on the southerly slopes I think the probability is higher hes on the unsearched northerly side slopes. I always said, he'll eventually be found in someplace no one ever thought he would be. If Bill was determined enough (and by most accounts he was) he could make the crest and still barely safely return to his parked car where there were nine bottles of water waiting. He was now 3 to 3 1/2 hours in and 5.3 miles from his vehicle. Bill flew to Los Angeles on Wednesday, June 23, 2010, for what would be his last trip to Joshua Tree. But after the official search ended, the unofficial search continued, including Tom Mahood, a former search and rescue worker based in California. On July 5, 2010, the official search was called off, 11 days after Bill was reported missing to Rangers as the money had been exhausted. At the time of his arrival in the park at around 10:20 am, there was no one else at the trailhead, however upon his return between 5.30 and 6.00 pm, he sawEwaskos car parked parallel and next to the curb on the north side of the parking area, instead of in one of the diagonally drawn designated parking spots. But if hes still got a bit of his wits about him he might realize he has a clever Hail Mary chance..get high enough up in the canyon to get a cell signal out. There are two areas of very pronounced vegetation in Smith Water Canyon, both pretty visible from the higher slopes of the canyon (and in Google Earth). Secondly, I assume that friends and family of Bill occasionally visit this website to check for updates and see if any progress is being made. Other Joshua trails also featured on his list. Since he would have likely known of the existence of water in Smith Water Canyon, about two miles away and much closer than his vehicle, he began a cross country diversion to Smith Water Canyon. Hesaid if the remains are confirmed to be Ewasko's, "it's a really odd area for him to have been in, and I can't fathom what he was thinking. That wasnt definitive proof of anything, if a long line of cars forms, members are often waved through, but it meant that there was no record of his visit. Ewasko went missing on June 24, 2010. A scent dog indicated a high probability that both the bottles and the bandana were Toms. Since the official search was called off, more than 1,000 miles of hiking routes have been searched, with new attempts continuing to this day. Previous search tracks are shown in red and black, and the Serin Tower 10.6 mile radius in light blue.If Bills on the southerly slopes it would have to be lower than the green area of very good cell coverage but in an overlooked spot. But from the vantage of Juniper Flats it doesnt look bad. The crest never seems very far away, yet is a considerable climb. OK thenlets crawl off to the easterly grove instead. Melson had been following the story of the Ewasko disappearance off and on, both through word of mouth in the search-and-rescue community and through Tom Mahoods blog. If the scenario is correct, the search area is likely constrained to a few hundred acres, in a location no one has ever thought to look. Later that morning, however, searchers recovered a red bandana on the ridge near Quail Mountain. His second call that morning was to Mary and she said that he was in high spirits that morning, and though she was concerned about the danger of visiting such an isolated location and tried to dissuade him, Bill did not indicate any change of plans, only that he planned to be out of the park by 5 pm to get dinner at Pappy & Harriets in Pioneertown, and that he would call Mary when he was out of the park. Certainly off the beaten track. He could have called for help if he needed it, and he did not. Yet clearly he still felt confident. "A press release will be forthcoming. It all fit so well I was really certain wed find him on the southerly Smith Water slopes. Pritchett looked but could not confirm this. A ranger was left at the car through the night, and in the morning with Bill having failed to show up, a proper search got underway using park personnel and volunteer search and rescue at about 7:30 a.m. that morning, fanning out in the most likely areas in the vicinity of Bills car. Ewasko had changed his plans for some reason. Unfortunately, another hiker would come forward later to claim the bottles casting the scent dogs alert to the bandana in doubt as well. Had he reached the bottom of Smith Water Canyon he obviously would have been found, therefore he obviously experienced some sort of accident on his descent into the canyon preventing him from reaching the bottom. The flatness and pleasantness of that trail can easily lure someone forward. After studying a number of lost person incidents Ive developed two beliefs. Apart from a bandana, nothing was found during large official and unofficial searches in the years following. This raised hopes that he was still alive and rangers requisitioned a night helicopter with thermal imaging capability to search the area. This usually manifests itself by the lost subject covering more ground than the searchers expected and thus leaving the search area. He actually might have been more mobile vertically than laterally as its possible to gain a lot of feet vertically for not much horizontal distance. The tracking dog indicated Ewasko may have taken the California Riding and Hiking Trail up to the point where it intersects with Juniper Flats Road where the latter heads toward Quail Mountain, but apparently was able to track no further. Bill planned to spend a week in the area and fly home on July 1, with a further trip to Florida planned on his return. Hewas an educator who loved the outdoors, according to his mother. After nearly 12 years, hikers at Joshua Tree National Park finally found Ewaskos remains on Tuesday, February 8, 2022, in the northwestern corner of the Joshua Tree Park adjacent to the Panorama Loop Trail and where the Bigfoot and Panorama Loop trails connect. Mara Rodriguez of the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department said the Specialized Investigations Division recovered human remains and the investigation were ongoing, "We have no confirmation of who the deceased is and will not be releasing any information about the identity until our Coroner's Division has completed their process and the next of kin has been notified., Tom Mahood said that he had researched the GPS tracking of the sheriff's helicopter that responded to the report of remains found and he said if the remains are confirmed to be Ewasko's, "it's a really odd area for him to have been in, and I can't fathom what he was thinking. The ridgeline where lights had been seen the previous night was searched, but nothing was found. The same day as Spitz died, a New York man was found dead on Bear Creek Trail near La Quinta. This was the first time The phone hadnt registered with any towers since the morning of his disappearance, suggesting that his phone had been turned off until that moment to conserve battery life or he had no service. Joshua Tree isn't the only wilderness area that has seen hiker deaths this winter. Extensive searching of all reasonable areas of the southerly slopes failed to turn up any trace of Bill. He may suspect people are searching for him by now, but hes far from any destination hed been planning for and has no reason to expect anyone to search where he is. Hes been out of water for days, is likely in shock and with serious injuries. It only is available at the upper parts of the side canyon, not that he could have known that. EMTs then hoisted Doggett into the helicopter and determined he was dead. Later that evening, she tried to call someone at the park, but by then Joshua Tree headquarters had closed for the day. Continuing on to Quail Mountain, a few hundred feet higher and another half mile away would now seem unwise (Bills signature was never found on the peaks register). Given such a small amount of water it may be that he was planning only a short walk along a relatively flat trail, and was going to eventually turn back. But in the end the effort proves too much and he succumbs somewhere up the slope. Bills precise arrival time at the Juniper Flats trailhead isnt known. On Tuesday two water bottles that were hidden under a log in the search area were discovered. 2022 www.desertsun.com. According to this data, Ewaskos phone was 10.6 miles away from the tower, which placed him so far beyond the official search area that, when rescuers first learned of the ping in 2010, many simply did not believe the data. I think Bill would likely have used most or all of his water supply upon reaching this point at Juniper Flats. Park Rangers quickly established that Ewaskos National Parks pass had never been scanned at either park entrance. But again, it makes sense to the subject at the time. That would put him in the vicinity of Smith Water Canyon. To briefly recap, my thoughts at the time were that Bill undertook a hike to Quail Mountain via its southerly face route reaching the crest of Quail Ridge very low on water. By January of 2013 (JT44) this resolved as the primary area of interest assuming an accident on descent into Smith Water and never reaching the bottom. First, everyone who approaches this case gives different weightings to the few hard bits of evidence available. In his mind it wasnt an emergency..yet. The Riverside Sheriffs Department stated that the original cell data no longer existed and the 10.6-mile number apparently came from a single technician and could have been a clerical error. At some point his phone connects briefly. When they failed to find Bill, Pritchett returned to the lot where he was soon joined by police from the neighboring county and volunteer searchers. The view from the upper reaches of Quail Mountain is vast, and its hard to be lost when much of the park and its roads are visible. But hey and follow on searchers found no trace. I think Bill took some sort of stumble, perhaps aggravated by dehydration, and suffered an incapacitating ambulatory injury. By any normal standard its not a good option, but this is far from normal and its realistically his only option. Most cellphones ping radio towers on a regular basis when they are used for a call, message or to access the internet The ping can be used to estimate the distance from a tower and hence to triangulate the location of the cell user. According to a 2018 article in the New York Times,Ewasko was an avid hiker and Vietnam vet whotraveled by himselffrom his home in suburban Atlanta to Joshua Tree andhe planned to hike for several days. The light blue line is the 10.6 mile radius from the Serin Drive cell tower. And by definition, missing people are always found in the last place someone thinks to look. My thinking is that he attempted something that none of us have yet thought of in our wildest imaginings, and possibly came close to pulling it off. An initial search was called off after a week. I last did a posting with my current thoughts way back in January of 2013 after only 43 search attempts. The thing I remember the most, Pylman said, was the frustration of: How can this be? To him, and the knowledge he had available, it made more sense than returning to his vehicle. An extensive search turned up no sign of him. With that in mind Ive always tried to be respectful and circumspect in putting out any theories of how Bill may have met his end. The ping distance, when figuring in the bounce path length, comes out about right. Volunteers were already arriving from throughout Southern California, and an incident command post was created at Cap Rock. I state this because upon reaching any portion of the Smith Water Canyon rim he would have been in an area of excellent cell phone coverage. After being joined by another ranger and the CHP helicopter, Pritchett drove up Juniper Flats Road, an old jeep trail now closed to the public but often used by hikers heading for Quail Mountain, calling to Ewasko via a loudspeaker. By this I mean something curtailing his ability to cover considerable ground. Previous search tracks are shown in red and black, and the Serin Tower 10.6 mile radius in light blue.If Bill's on the southerly slopes it would have to be lower than the green area of very good cell coverage but in an overlooked spot. By May of 2016 the area of interest had been searched very well, tracks in red, suggesting an accident on descent might not be the correct scenario. How can we have so much information about where he was going to go, or at least where he said he was going to go why cant we find him?, Careys Castle was only one of several locations on Ewaskos itinerary. How could that be the case? Mahood had cellphone records which showed that at 6:50 a.m. on Sunday, June 27, 2010, three days after Ewasko last spoke with Mary Winston, his phone communicated with a Verizon tower just outside the parks northwestern edge, above the town of Yucca Valley. He is responsible for the discovery of the Death Valley Germans (Egbert Rimkus, Georg Weber, Cornelia Meyer, Max Meyer). Upon their return, several of the searchers pointed towards a nearby ridge and said that they could see lights. Given the temperatures, he may have begun to experience initial symptoms of dehydration and realized he could be in a small predicament by overextending himself. A friend of Doggett's had previously reported that he had gone hiking alone and could not be reached by phone. After performing signal tests throughout Covington Flats, however, Melson found that his numerous attempts to mark a specific distance from the Verizon tower revealed large margins of error. a New York man was found dead on Bear Creek Trail near La Quinta. Winston, reached Wednesday night by The Desert Sun, declined to talk about Ewasko. There, hikers have collectively posted many hundreds of times about Ewasko since May 2012. The nearest salvation, Park Road, is 3.5 miles away, invisible to Bill and impossible to reach in his dire condition. So heres the sequence of events I think seem to best fit what is known to date: Around 7 AM on Thursday June 24, Bill makes a cell call to David Rosso, the owner of the condo he was staying at, saying he was headed for Joshua Tree that day. This theory fit what was known at the time very well and directed many of my (and others) search attempts since. According to park Superintendent David A. Smith,the remains wereold and are being investigated as a homicide by the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department. And if he took the fairly obvious route descending a very pronounced side canyon, it wasnt really awful (such things are relative in Smith Water Canyon). The station did not say how it learned that. So Bill set off for Smith Water Canyon and the water he expected to find. So all that can be said is Bill arrived sometime after 10:20 AM. It would make for a long day and he would miss his dinner schedule at Pappy and Harriets in Pioneertown but it could be an epic adventure. The second belief Ive developed is that subjects who arent immediately found by SAR personnel usually do something unexpected or unanticipated by searchers. I will confess that in a wonderful display of hubris I even named one of our first search plans for the area Endgame. Since this is a junction of all trails in the area, it offered no guidance as to where Bill might have gone next. Guidebooks written before our multiyear drought make it sound like theres much more water then there actually is, especially in summer months. This may have been occurring with multiple iterations in the Ewasko case. Even so, he may have been tempted to push further on to just reach the top of the ridge because it appears so close (I have made these sort of questionable decisions many times myself). They were only able to cover part of the area before the light faded. "We have no confirmation of who the deceased is and will not be releasing any information about the identity until our Coroner's Division has completed their process and the next of kin has been notified," she said in an e-mail. Based upon Bills stated location, with normal driving and no detours, he should have ended up at the Juniper Flats trailhead around 9:15 AM. And from what limited data we could uncover, it appeared Verizons reported distance of 10.6 miles was likely accurate. On his way to the park the morning of June 24, Bill made two phone calls, reporting that he was on Interstate 10 near Palm Desert, a location subsequently verified by cell phone records. We assumed he did something a bit unexpected and ended up in an unsearched area so we set about clearing them. A hiker arriving at the trailhead at 10:20 AM saw no other vehicles, but saw Bills car when he returned from his hike around 5:30 PM. The Ewasko search thread hosted by the Mount San Jacinto Outdoor Recreation forum. ", Mahood told The Desert Sun on Wednesday that he had researched the GPS tracking of the sheriff's helicopter that responded to the report of remains found on Wednesday morning. Dave Pylman, the parks deputy planning chief and a former executive director of Friends of Joshua Tree, a climbing-advocacy group, as well as a 19-year veteran of Joshua Tree Search and Rescue, was put in charge of routes, teams and search areas. Yet initial searchers, who would have quickly found a subject in this situation, found no trace. The first call was to the owner of Bills condo. Mahood has published many posts on his blog about Ewaskos disappearance. From this point to the top of Quail Mountain there are no marked/signed trails, only cross country routes some of which have been published. How high he could have crawled its hard to say, but Id guess something less than a few hundred feet. Had Ewasko finally reached a high-enough point where he was confident he could get a clear signal but his battery had given up on him? But then, at some point, at least half way down, things went seriously wrong. Your California Privacy Rights / Privacy Policy. It would have taken him at least an hour to cover the 1.5 miles to the canyon rim, maybe double that as dehydration symptoms increased across the rugged terrain. It appears very close and if checked on a map its only 1.5 miles to the rim of the canyon. And while the 10.6 mile distance is closer to the northerly slopes than the searched southerly ones, their orientation is not line of sight to the cell tower so it shouldnt be pingable from there. Evidence like where his car was, where he would have been hiking, accuracy of the cell ping, where hes known to not be, things like that. But while it looks simple, its a 900 climb in 1.3 miles to reach the top of the ridgeline Quail Mountain is a part of. He was supposed to return to his vehicle and call his girlfriend at 5.00 pm, but he never did. I should point out that one of the symptoms of dehydration is confusion and impaired judgment (Sadly, I can speak from personal experience on this). While we now know the conclusion, we may likely never know any details unless Bill left behind any surviving notes as to his predicament. He could turn around any time if he got too thirsty or too hot. If one gives high weight to the accuracy of the cell ping distance there is a scenario which fits pretty much all that is known about the case and explains why no trace has yet been found. Although it is a cross country route, from this viewpoint it appears rather reasonable. But he had absolutely no margin for error. 'Something RichardFeynman described as a 'failure of imagination.' He has to know that at this point he likely has only hours left to him. At this point I think Bill did something none of the initial searchers could have foreseen. This is why lost people usually travel downhill as its easier. Clearly no one would make the grueling descent into Smith Water then start up the other side, would they? This suggests whatever accident occurred, it was in the lower half of the descent to the Smith Water Canyon bottom. Winston reported him missing the next day. After more than a year of hiking in the Death Valley area, on November 12, 2009, Mahood and another searcher found the remains of the German family who disappeared in Death Valley 13 years earlier on 23 July 1996. Pritchett dropped off two teams of searchers to cover the California Riding and Hiking Trail, which runs roughly parallel to Juniper Flats Road and recrosses it near Juniper Flat, and Stubbe Springs Trail, a side loop trail. At first, he said, Ewasko appeared to be a typical lost tourist: someone who goes out by himself, encounters a problem of some sort, fails to report back at a prearranged time and eventually finds his way back to known territory. One of the itineraries had listed for that Thursday Thousand Palms, Joshua Tree all day, Lost Horse Mountain which added little to the information already at hand. So two people looking at the same evidence may come to very different conclusions depending on how important they think each data point is. awallet was found with the remains with the name of Bill Ewasko. However with the mountain directly in front, the frontal approach looks easiest. While a cell signal could have been a salvation, he had a much more urgent need for water, which he knew existed at the bottom of Smith Water. Heres the thing about Smith Water Canyon..There IS water there year round, but you have to know where to look. This means that Bills car arrived at the parking lot no earlier than 10:20 am, leaving, at minimum, a nearly 2 hour gap from his last phone call. In fact the path length is better for the northerly slopes than most places on the southerly slopes. He also saw a single line of fresh boot tracks going up the old Juniper Flats road. Although Mahood participated in the official search for Bill Ewasko, helping to clear the region around Quail Mountain, the case became an obsession and he has become determined to find Bill.
I believe Bill considered the 5.3 miles back to the car against the 2.5 miles to the water of Smith Water Canyon and chose to head cross country to Smith Water. Later cell records confirm both calls, and the tower in use during the second call is consistent with Bills stated location. I personally find climbing up its slick slope pretty puckery with two good legs and it might be completely impossible with a broken ankle, effectively shutting the door to the westerly grove. But 5 pm came and went with no phone call. Riverside County Sheriffs Department was now an active partner in the search. As the search ramped up on Saturday morning, June 26th, it appeared it was merely a missing hiker somewhere between the Juniper Flats trailhead and Quail Mountain. Reaching the pleasant flat area that is the obvious saddle on the Smith Water rim, I suspect Bill felt his chances were excellent. It was yet another failure of imagination. According to Melsons measurements, Ewaskos phone could have been anywhere from a quarter-mile farther away to very nearly at the base of the tower itself, due to reflections off mountains and rocks. He left a rough itinerary behind with his girlfriend, Mary Winston, featuring multiple destinations, both inside and outside the park. Nope, not even close. They are dense groves of Acacias (I think) and are obvious markers for water. Its clearly nonsensical hed cross Smith Water and head up the north side. All rights reserved. Ewasko was an Army veteran who served in Vietnam and an experienced hiker who has visited Joshua Tree National Park on several previous occasions, and he was in good physical shape in 2010, with no medical problems. The park sees nearly 50 such cases every year. This is close to the 10.6 mile Serin Tower radius. On July 5, 11 days later, the official search was called off. They are looking at any evidence they found at the site to determine who the person is.. The location of the find was described as odd, with Tom Mahood, who had previously searched for Bill without success saying, "it's a really odd area for him to have been in, and I can't fathom what he was thinking.". For unknown reasons his card wasnt recorded at the western park entrance station despite its opening around 8 AM. His whereabouts between 8 AM and 10:20 AM are unclear but could be attributed to his stopping and taking pictures as he liked to do in Joshua Tree. A broken leg or ankle would likely have Bill crawling at this point, but getting to either area of vegetation would appear possible to him. But if he tried heading for the nearer, westerly Acacia grove hed quickly find his way blocked by a dry waterfall before reaching the grove. A lot of pondering and trying to get into Bills head lead to what I posted in January of 2013. Around 8 AM that same morning Bill makes a call to Mary Winston in Georgia. It should have only taken Bill about half that time to reach Juniper Flats trailhead and it is not known where Bill was for the extra hour or so. According to Park Superintendent, David A. Smith, the remains were old and were being investigated as a homicide by the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department. ", Mahood added: "While we now know the conclusion, we may likely never know any detailsunless Bill left behind any surviving notes as to his predicament.". It is possible he was waved through without scanning. Unfortunately, there were at least two things Bill didnt know about this route. First, its a lot rougher than it looks, with much rock hopping involved. Mara Rodriguez of the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department said theSpecialized Investigations Division recovered human remains and the investigation is ongoing. Taking out his cell phone and powering it up to call for help, he would have found no service. In Summer, Ive only seen water in the westerly grove, above the dry waterfall. ", "I always said, he'll eventually befound in someplace no one ever thought he would be," said Mahood via email. He spent the night at a friends vacant condominium before driving to Joshua Tree on the following day, June 24. Melson drove to Joshua Tree in-person to explore Covington Flats, one of several possible sites where Ewaskos ping might have originated. Locating the car confirmed that Bill was inside the park and searchers relocated to Juniper Flats and explored areas including the top of Quail Mountain and south to Keys View. A helicopter was used to search for Doggett by air and located himon rocky terrain. His goal was to learn if the pings suggested 10.6-mile radius could have been accurate. In late January, a hiker diedafter an apparent fall on rocky and remote terrain near Idyllwild. The light blue line is the 10.6 mile radius from the Serin Drive cell tower. I think what a man of Bills reported determination may have attempted in his last hours could have a great deal to do with why hes not been yet found. Mike Melson became interested in the disappearance in the spring of 2012. Frankly, Id much prefer someone other than I find Bill, and if laying my thoughts out here makes that happen, then great! However, an informal group of sleuths continued to look for Ewasko over the years. Or the subject heads in an unexpected direction for reasons unknown to the searchers. Due to that amount of search coverage completed on the southerly slopes I think the probability is higher hes on the unsearched northerly side slopes. I always said, he'll eventually be found in someplace no one ever thought he would be. If Bill was determined enough (and by most accounts he was) he could make the crest and still barely safely return to his parked car where there were nine bottles of water waiting. He was now 3 to 3 1/2 hours in and 5.3 miles from his vehicle. Bill flew to Los Angeles on Wednesday, June 23, 2010, for what would be his last trip to Joshua Tree. But after the official search ended, the unofficial search continued, including Tom Mahood, a former search and rescue worker based in California. On July 5, 2010, the official search was called off, 11 days after Bill was reported missing to Rangers as the money had been exhausted. At the time of his arrival in the park at around 10:20 am, there was no one else at the trailhead, however upon his return between 5.30 and 6.00 pm, he sawEwaskos car parked parallel and next to the curb on the north side of the parking area, instead of in one of the diagonally drawn designated parking spots. But if hes still got a bit of his wits about him he might realize he has a clever Hail Mary chance..get high enough up in the canyon to get a cell signal out. There are two areas of very pronounced vegetation in Smith Water Canyon, both pretty visible from the higher slopes of the canyon (and in Google Earth). Secondly, I assume that friends and family of Bill occasionally visit this website to check for updates and see if any progress is being made. Other Joshua trails also featured on his list. Since he would have likely known of the existence of water in Smith Water Canyon, about two miles away and much closer than his vehicle, he began a cross country diversion to Smith Water Canyon. Hesaid if the remains are confirmed to be Ewasko's, "it's a really odd area for him to have been in, and I can't fathom what he was thinking. That wasnt definitive proof of anything, if a long line of cars forms, members are often waved through, but it meant that there was no record of his visit. Ewasko went missing on June 24, 2010. A scent dog indicated a high probability that both the bottles and the bandana were Toms. Since the official search was called off, more than 1,000 miles of hiking routes have been searched, with new attempts continuing to this day. Previous search tracks are shown in red and black, and the Serin Tower 10.6 mile radius in light blue.If Bills on the southerly slopes it would have to be lower than the green area of very good cell coverage but in an overlooked spot. But from the vantage of Juniper Flats it doesnt look bad. The crest never seems very far away, yet is a considerable climb. OK thenlets crawl off to the easterly grove instead. Melson had been following the story of the Ewasko disappearance off and on, both through word of mouth in the search-and-rescue community and through Tom Mahoods blog. If the scenario is correct, the search area is likely constrained to a few hundred acres, in a location no one has ever thought to look. Later that morning, however, searchers recovered a red bandana on the ridge near Quail Mountain. His second call that morning was to Mary and she said that he was in high spirits that morning, and though she was concerned about the danger of visiting such an isolated location and tried to dissuade him, Bill did not indicate any change of plans, only that he planned to be out of the park by 5 pm to get dinner at Pappy & Harriets in Pioneertown, and that he would call Mary when he was out of the park. Certainly off the beaten track. He could have called for help if he needed it, and he did not. Yet clearly he still felt confident. "A press release will be forthcoming. It all fit so well I was really certain wed find him on the southerly Smith Water slopes. Pritchett looked but could not confirm this. A ranger was left at the car through the night, and in the morning with Bill having failed to show up, a proper search got underway using park personnel and volunteer search and rescue at about 7:30 a.m. that morning, fanning out in the most likely areas in the vicinity of Bills car. Ewasko had changed his plans for some reason. Unfortunately, another hiker would come forward later to claim the bottles casting the scent dogs alert to the bandana in doubt as well. Had he reached the bottom of Smith Water Canyon he obviously would have been found, therefore he obviously experienced some sort of accident on his descent into the canyon preventing him from reaching the bottom. The flatness and pleasantness of that trail can easily lure someone forward. After studying a number of lost person incidents Ive developed two beliefs. Apart from a bandana, nothing was found during large official and unofficial searches in the years following. This raised hopes that he was still alive and rangers requisitioned a night helicopter with thermal imaging capability to search the area. This usually manifests itself by the lost subject covering more ground than the searchers expected and thus leaving the search area. He actually might have been more mobile vertically than laterally as its possible to gain a lot of feet vertically for not much horizontal distance. The tracking dog indicated Ewasko may have taken the California Riding and Hiking Trail up to the point where it intersects with Juniper Flats Road where the latter heads toward Quail Mountain, but apparently was able to track no further. Bill planned to spend a week in the area and fly home on July 1, with a further trip to Florida planned on his return. Hewas an educator who loved the outdoors, according to his mother. After nearly 12 years, hikers at Joshua Tree National Park finally found Ewaskos remains on Tuesday, February 8, 2022, in the northwestern corner of the Joshua Tree Park adjacent to the Panorama Loop Trail and where the Bigfoot and Panorama Loop trails connect. Mara Rodriguez of the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department said the Specialized Investigations Division recovered human remains and the investigation were ongoing, "We have no confirmation of who the deceased is and will not be releasing any information about the identity until our Coroner's Division has completed their process and the next of kin has been notified., Tom Mahood said that he had researched the GPS tracking of the sheriff's helicopter that responded to the report of remains found and he said if the remains are confirmed to be Ewasko's, "it's a really odd area for him to have been in, and I can't fathom what he was thinking. The ridgeline where lights had been seen the previous night was searched, but nothing was found. The same day as Spitz died, a New York man was found dead on Bear Creek Trail near La Quinta. This was the first time The phone hadnt registered with any towers since the morning of his disappearance, suggesting that his phone had been turned off until that moment to conserve battery life or he had no service. Joshua Tree isn't the only wilderness area that has seen hiker deaths this winter. Extensive searching of all reasonable areas of the southerly slopes failed to turn up any trace of Bill. He may suspect people are searching for him by now, but hes far from any destination hed been planning for and has no reason to expect anyone to search where he is. Hes been out of water for days, is likely in shock and with serious injuries. It only is available at the upper parts of the side canyon, not that he could have known that. EMTs then hoisted Doggett into the helicopter and determined he was dead. Later that evening, she tried to call someone at the park, but by then Joshua Tree headquarters had closed for the day. Continuing on to Quail Mountain, a few hundred feet higher and another half mile away would now seem unwise (Bills signature was never found on the peaks register). Given such a small amount of water it may be that he was planning only a short walk along a relatively flat trail, and was going to eventually turn back. But in the end the effort proves too much and he succumbs somewhere up the slope. Bills precise arrival time at the Juniper Flats trailhead isnt known. On Tuesday two water bottles that were hidden under a log in the search area were discovered. 2022 www.desertsun.com. According to this data, Ewaskos phone was 10.6 miles away from the tower, which placed him so far beyond the official search area that, when rescuers first learned of the ping in 2010, many simply did not believe the data. I think Bill would likely have used most or all of his water supply upon reaching this point at Juniper Flats. Park Rangers quickly established that Ewaskos National Parks pass had never been scanned at either park entrance. But again, it makes sense to the subject at the time. That would put him in the vicinity of Smith Water Canyon. To briefly recap, my thoughts at the time were that Bill undertook a hike to Quail Mountain via its southerly face route reaching the crest of Quail Ridge very low on water. By January of 2013 (JT44) this resolved as the primary area of interest assuming an accident on descent into Smith Water and never reaching the bottom. First, everyone who approaches this case gives different weightings to the few hard bits of evidence available. In his mind it wasnt an emergency..yet. The Riverside Sheriffs Department stated that the original cell data no longer existed and the 10.6-mile number apparently came from a single technician and could have been a clerical error. At some point his phone connects briefly. When they failed to find Bill, Pritchett returned to the lot where he was soon joined by police from the neighboring county and volunteer searchers. The view from the upper reaches of Quail Mountain is vast, and its hard to be lost when much of the park and its roads are visible. But hey and follow on searchers found no trace. I think Bill took some sort of stumble, perhaps aggravated by dehydration, and suffered an incapacitating ambulatory injury. By any normal standard its not a good option, but this is far from normal and its realistically his only option. Most cellphones ping radio towers on a regular basis when they are used for a call, message or to access the internet The ping can be used to estimate the distance from a tower and hence to triangulate the location of the cell user. According to a 2018 article in the New York Times,Ewasko was an avid hiker and Vietnam vet whotraveled by himselffrom his home in suburban Atlanta to Joshua Tree andhe planned to hike for several days. The light blue line is the 10.6 mile radius from the Serin Drive cell tower. And by definition, missing people are always found in the last place someone thinks to look. My thinking is that he attempted something that none of us have yet thought of in our wildest imaginings, and possibly came close to pulling it off. An initial search was called off after a week. I last did a posting with my current thoughts way back in January of 2013 after only 43 search attempts. The thing I remember the most, Pylman said, was the frustration of: How can this be? To him, and the knowledge he had available, it made more sense than returning to his vehicle. An extensive search turned up no sign of him. With that in mind Ive always tried to be respectful and circumspect in putting out any theories of how Bill may have met his end. The ping distance, when figuring in the bounce path length, comes out about right. Volunteers were already arriving from throughout Southern California, and an incident command post was created at Cap Rock. I state this because upon reaching any portion of the Smith Water Canyon rim he would have been in an area of excellent cell phone coverage. After being joined by another ranger and the CHP helicopter, Pritchett drove up Juniper Flats Road, an old jeep trail now closed to the public but often used by hikers heading for Quail Mountain, calling to Ewasko via a loudspeaker. By this I mean something curtailing his ability to cover considerable ground. Previous search tracks are shown in red and black, and the Serin Tower 10.6 mile radius in light blue.If Bill's on the southerly slopes it would have to be lower than the green area of very good cell coverage but in an overlooked spot. By May of 2016 the area of interest had been searched very well, tracks in red, suggesting an accident on descent might not be the correct scenario. How can we have so much information about where he was going to go, or at least where he said he was going to go why cant we find him?, Careys Castle was only one of several locations on Ewaskos itinerary. How could that be the case? Mahood had cellphone records which showed that at 6:50 a.m. on Sunday, June 27, 2010, three days after Ewasko last spoke with Mary Winston, his phone communicated with a Verizon tower just outside the parks northwestern edge, above the town of Yucca Valley. He is responsible for the discovery of the Death Valley Germans (Egbert Rimkus, Georg Weber, Cornelia Meyer, Max Meyer). Upon their return, several of the searchers pointed towards a nearby ridge and said that they could see lights. Given the temperatures, he may have begun to experience initial symptoms of dehydration and realized he could be in a small predicament by overextending himself. A friend of Doggett's had previously reported that he had gone hiking alone and could not be reached by phone. After performing signal tests throughout Covington Flats, however, Melson found that his numerous attempts to mark a specific distance from the Verizon tower revealed large margins of error. a New York man was found dead on Bear Creek Trail near La Quinta. Winston, reached Wednesday night by The Desert Sun, declined to talk about Ewasko. There, hikers have collectively posted many hundreds of times about Ewasko since May 2012. The nearest salvation, Park Road, is 3.5 miles away, invisible to Bill and impossible to reach in his dire condition. So heres the sequence of events I think seem to best fit what is known to date: Around 7 AM on Thursday June 24, Bill makes a cell call to David Rosso, the owner of the condo he was staying at, saying he was headed for Joshua Tree that day. This theory fit what was known at the time very well and directed many of my (and others) search attempts since. According to park Superintendent David A. Smith,the remains wereold and are being investigated as a homicide by the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department. And if he took the fairly obvious route descending a very pronounced side canyon, it wasnt really awful (such things are relative in Smith Water Canyon). The station did not say how it learned that. So Bill set off for Smith Water Canyon and the water he expected to find. So all that can be said is Bill arrived sometime after 10:20 AM. It would make for a long day and he would miss his dinner schedule at Pappy and Harriets in Pioneertown but it could be an epic adventure. The second belief Ive developed is that subjects who arent immediately found by SAR personnel usually do something unexpected or unanticipated by searchers. I will confess that in a wonderful display of hubris I even named one of our first search plans for the area Endgame. Since this is a junction of all trails in the area, it offered no guidance as to where Bill might have gone next. Guidebooks written before our multiyear drought make it sound like theres much more water then there actually is, especially in summer months. This may have been occurring with multiple iterations in the Ewasko case. Even so, he may have been tempted to push further on to just reach the top of the ridge because it appears so close (I have made these sort of questionable decisions many times myself). They were only able to cover part of the area before the light faded. "We have no confirmation of who the deceased is and will not be releasing any information about the identity until our Coroner's Division has completed their process and the next of kin has been notified," she said in an e-mail. Based upon Bills stated location, with normal driving and no detours, he should have ended up at the Juniper Flats trailhead around 9:15 AM. And from what limited data we could uncover, it appeared Verizons reported distance of 10.6 miles was likely accurate. On his way to the park the morning of June 24, Bill made two phone calls, reporting that he was on Interstate 10 near Palm Desert, a location subsequently verified by cell phone records. We assumed he did something a bit unexpected and ended up in an unsearched area so we set about clearing them. A hiker arriving at the trailhead at 10:20 AM saw no other vehicles, but saw Bills car when he returned from his hike around 5:30 PM. The Ewasko search thread hosted by the Mount San Jacinto Outdoor Recreation forum. ", Mahood told The Desert Sun on Wednesday that he had researched the GPS tracking of the sheriff's helicopter that responded to the report of remains found on Wednesday morning. Dave Pylman, the parks deputy planning chief and a former executive director of Friends of Joshua Tree, a climbing-advocacy group, as well as a 19-year veteran of Joshua Tree Search and Rescue, was put in charge of routes, teams and search areas. Yet initial searchers, who would have quickly found a subject in this situation, found no trace. The first call was to the owner of Bills condo. Mahood has published many posts on his blog about Ewaskos disappearance. From this point to the top of Quail Mountain there are no marked/signed trails, only cross country routes some of which have been published. How high he could have crawled its hard to say, but Id guess something less than a few hundred feet. Had Ewasko finally reached a high-enough point where he was confident he could get a clear signal but his battery had given up on him? But then, at some point, at least half way down, things went seriously wrong. Your California Privacy Rights / Privacy Policy. It would have taken him at least an hour to cover the 1.5 miles to the canyon rim, maybe double that as dehydration symptoms increased across the rugged terrain. It appears very close and if checked on a map its only 1.5 miles to the rim of the canyon. And while the 10.6 mile distance is closer to the northerly slopes than the searched southerly ones, their orientation is not line of sight to the cell tower so it shouldnt be pingable from there. Evidence like where his car was, where he would have been hiking, accuracy of the cell ping, where hes known to not be, things like that. But while it looks simple, its a 900 climb in 1.3 miles to reach the top of the ridgeline Quail Mountain is a part of. He was supposed to return to his vehicle and call his girlfriend at 5.00 pm, but he never did. I should point out that one of the symptoms of dehydration is confusion and impaired judgment (Sadly, I can speak from personal experience on this). While we now know the conclusion, we may likely never know any details unless Bill left behind any surviving notes as to his predicament. He could turn around any time if he got too thirsty or too hot. If one gives high weight to the accuracy of the cell ping distance there is a scenario which fits pretty much all that is known about the case and explains why no trace has yet been found. Although it is a cross country route, from this viewpoint it appears rather reasonable. But he had absolutely no margin for error. 'Something RichardFeynman described as a 'failure of imagination.' He has to know that at this point he likely has only hours left to him. At this point I think Bill did something none of the initial searchers could have foreseen. This is why lost people usually travel downhill as its easier. Clearly no one would make the grueling descent into Smith Water then start up the other side, would they? This suggests whatever accident occurred, it was in the lower half of the descent to the Smith Water Canyon bottom. Winston reported him missing the next day. After more than a year of hiking in the Death Valley area, on November 12, 2009, Mahood and another searcher found the remains of the German family who disappeared in Death Valley 13 years earlier on 23 July 1996. Pritchett dropped off two teams of searchers to cover the California Riding and Hiking Trail, which runs roughly parallel to Juniper Flats Road and recrosses it near Juniper Flat, and Stubbe Springs Trail, a side loop trail. At first, he said, Ewasko appeared to be a typical lost tourist: someone who goes out by himself, encounters a problem of some sort, fails to report back at a prearranged time and eventually finds his way back to known territory. One of the itineraries had listed for that Thursday Thousand Palms, Joshua Tree all day, Lost Horse Mountain which added little to the information already at hand. So two people looking at the same evidence may come to very different conclusions depending on how important they think each data point is. awallet was found with the remains with the name of Bill Ewasko. However with the mountain directly in front, the frontal approach looks easiest. While a cell signal could have been a salvation, he had a much more urgent need for water, which he knew existed at the bottom of Smith Water. Heres the thing about Smith Water Canyon..There IS water there year round, but you have to know where to look. This means that Bills car arrived at the parking lot no earlier than 10:20 am, leaving, at minimum, a nearly 2 hour gap from his last phone call. In fact the path length is better for the northerly slopes than most places on the southerly slopes. He also saw a single line of fresh boot tracks going up the old Juniper Flats road. Although Mahood participated in the official search for Bill Ewasko, helping to clear the region around Quail Mountain, the case became an obsession and he has become determined to find Bill.
", Mahood added: "While we now know the conclusion, we may likely never know any detailsunless Bill left behind any surviving notes as to his predicament.". It is possible he was waved through without scanning. Unfortunately, there were at least two things Bill didnt know about this route. First, its a lot rougher than it looks, with much rock hopping involved. Mara Rodriguez of the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department said theSpecialized Investigations Division recovered human remains and the investigation is ongoing. Taking out his cell phone and powering it up to call for help, he would have found no service. In Summer, Ive only seen water in the westerly grove, above the dry waterfall. ", "I always said, he'll eventually befound in someplace no one ever thought he would be," said Mahood via email. He spent the night at a friends vacant condominium before driving to Joshua Tree on the following day, June 24. Melson drove to Joshua Tree in-person to explore Covington Flats, one of several possible sites where Ewaskos ping might have originated. Locating the car confirmed that Bill was inside the park and searchers relocated to Juniper Flats and explored areas including the top of Quail Mountain and south to Keys View. A helicopter was used to search for Doggett by air and located himon rocky terrain. His goal was to learn if the pings suggested 10.6-mile radius could have been accurate. In late January, a hiker diedafter an apparent fall on rocky and remote terrain near Idyllwild. The light blue line is the 10.6 mile radius from the Serin Drive cell tower. I think what a man of Bills reported determination may have attempted in his last hours could have a great deal to do with why hes not been yet found. Mike Melson became interested in the disappearance in the spring of 2012. Frankly, Id much prefer someone other than I find Bill, and if laying my thoughts out here makes that happen, then great! However, an informal group of sleuths continued to look for Ewasko over the years. Or the subject heads in an unexpected direction for reasons unknown to the searchers. Due to that amount of search coverage completed on the southerly slopes I think the probability is higher hes on the unsearched northerly side slopes. I always said, he'll eventually be found in someplace no one ever thought he would be. If Bill was determined enough (and by most accounts he was) he could make the crest and still barely safely return to his parked car where there were nine bottles of water waiting. He was now 3 to 3 1/2 hours in and 5.3 miles from his vehicle. Bill flew to Los Angeles on Wednesday, June 23, 2010, for what would be his last trip to Joshua Tree. But after the official search ended, the unofficial search continued, including Tom Mahood, a former search and rescue worker based in California. On July 5, 2010, the official search was called off, 11 days after Bill was reported missing to Rangers as the money had been exhausted. At the time of his arrival in the park at around 10:20 am, there was no one else at the trailhead, however upon his return between 5.30 and 6.00 pm, he sawEwaskos car parked parallel and next to the curb on the north side of the parking area, instead of in one of the diagonally drawn designated parking spots. But if hes still got a bit of his wits about him he might realize he has a clever Hail Mary chance..get high enough up in the canyon to get a cell signal out. There are two areas of very pronounced vegetation in Smith Water Canyon, both pretty visible from the higher slopes of the canyon (and in Google Earth). Secondly, I assume that friends and family of Bill occasionally visit this website to check for updates and see if any progress is being made. Other Joshua trails also featured on his list. Since he would have likely known of the existence of water in Smith Water Canyon, about two miles away and much closer than his vehicle, he began a cross country diversion to Smith Water Canyon. Hesaid if the remains are confirmed to be Ewasko's, "it's a really odd area for him to have been in, and I can't fathom what he was thinking. That wasnt definitive proof of anything, if a long line of cars forms, members are often waved through, but it meant that there was no record of his visit. Ewasko went missing on June 24, 2010. A scent dog indicated a high probability that both the bottles and the bandana were Toms. Since the official search was called off, more than 1,000 miles of hiking routes have been searched, with new attempts continuing to this day. Previous search tracks are shown in red and black, and the Serin Tower 10.6 mile radius in light blue.If Bills on the southerly slopes it would have to be lower than the green area of very good cell coverage but in an overlooked spot. But from the vantage of Juniper Flats it doesnt look bad. The crest never seems very far away, yet is a considerable climb. OK thenlets crawl off to the easterly grove instead. Melson had been following the story of the Ewasko disappearance off and on, both through word of mouth in the search-and-rescue community and through Tom Mahoods blog. If the scenario is correct, the search area is likely constrained to a few hundred acres, in a location no one has ever thought to look. Later that morning, however, searchers recovered a red bandana on the ridge near Quail Mountain. His second call that morning was to Mary and she said that he was in high spirits that morning, and though she was concerned about the danger of visiting such an isolated location and tried to dissuade him, Bill did not indicate any change of plans, only that he planned to be out of the park by 5 pm to get dinner at Pappy & Harriets in Pioneertown, and that he would call Mary when he was out of the park. Certainly off the beaten track. He could have called for help if he needed it, and he did not. Yet clearly he still felt confident. "A press release will be forthcoming. It all fit so well I was really certain wed find him on the southerly Smith Water slopes. Pritchett looked but could not confirm this. A ranger was left at the car through the night, and in the morning with Bill having failed to show up, a proper search got underway using park personnel and volunteer search and rescue at about 7:30 a.m. that morning, fanning out in the most likely areas in the vicinity of Bills car. Ewasko had changed his plans for some reason. Unfortunately, another hiker would come forward later to claim the bottles casting the scent dogs alert to the bandana in doubt as well. Had he reached the bottom of Smith Water Canyon he obviously would have been found, therefore he obviously experienced some sort of accident on his descent into the canyon preventing him from reaching the bottom. The flatness and pleasantness of that trail can easily lure someone forward. After studying a number of lost person incidents Ive developed two beliefs. Apart from a bandana, nothing was found during large official and unofficial searches in the years following. This raised hopes that he was still alive and rangers requisitioned a night helicopter with thermal imaging capability to search the area. This usually manifests itself by the lost subject covering more ground than the searchers expected and thus leaving the search area. He actually might have been more mobile vertically than laterally as its possible to gain a lot of feet vertically for not much horizontal distance. The tracking dog indicated Ewasko may have taken the California Riding and Hiking Trail up to the point where it intersects with Juniper Flats Road where the latter heads toward Quail Mountain, but apparently was able to track no further. Bill planned to spend a week in the area and fly home on July 1, with a further trip to Florida planned on his return. Hewas an educator who loved the outdoors, according to his mother. After nearly 12 years, hikers at Joshua Tree National Park finally found Ewaskos remains on Tuesday, February 8, 2022, in the northwestern corner of the Joshua Tree Park adjacent to the Panorama Loop Trail and where the Bigfoot and Panorama Loop trails connect. Mara Rodriguez of the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department said the Specialized Investigations Division recovered human remains and the investigation were ongoing, "We have no confirmation of who the deceased is and will not be releasing any information about the identity until our Coroner's Division has completed their process and the next of kin has been notified., Tom Mahood said that he had researched the GPS tracking of the sheriff's helicopter that responded to the report of remains found and he said if the remains are confirmed to be Ewasko's, "it's a really odd area for him to have been in, and I can't fathom what he was thinking. The ridgeline where lights had been seen the previous night was searched, but nothing was found. The same day as Spitz died, a New York man was found dead on Bear Creek Trail near La Quinta. This was the first time The phone hadnt registered with any towers since the morning of his disappearance, suggesting that his phone had been turned off until that moment to conserve battery life or he had no service. Joshua Tree isn't the only wilderness area that has seen hiker deaths this winter. Extensive searching of all reasonable areas of the southerly slopes failed to turn up any trace of Bill. He may suspect people are searching for him by now, but hes far from any destination hed been planning for and has no reason to expect anyone to search where he is. Hes been out of water for days, is likely in shock and with serious injuries. It only is available at the upper parts of the side canyon, not that he could have known that. EMTs then hoisted Doggett into the helicopter and determined he was dead. Later that evening, she tried to call someone at the park, but by then Joshua Tree headquarters had closed for the day. Continuing on to Quail Mountain, a few hundred feet higher and another half mile away would now seem unwise (Bills signature was never found on the peaks register). Given such a small amount of water it may be that he was planning only a short walk along a relatively flat trail, and was going to eventually turn back. But in the end the effort proves too much and he succumbs somewhere up the slope. Bills precise arrival time at the Juniper Flats trailhead isnt known. On Tuesday two water bottles that were hidden under a log in the search area were discovered. 2022 www.desertsun.com. According to this data, Ewaskos phone was 10.6 miles away from the tower, which placed him so far beyond the official search area that, when rescuers first learned of the ping in 2010, many simply did not believe the data. I think Bill would likely have used most or all of his water supply upon reaching this point at Juniper Flats. Park Rangers quickly established that Ewaskos National Parks pass had never been scanned at either park entrance. But again, it makes sense to the subject at the time. That would put him in the vicinity of Smith Water Canyon. To briefly recap, my thoughts at the time were that Bill undertook a hike to Quail Mountain via its southerly face route reaching the crest of Quail Ridge very low on water. By January of 2013 (JT44) this resolved as the primary area of interest assuming an accident on descent into Smith Water and never reaching the bottom. First, everyone who approaches this case gives different weightings to the few hard bits of evidence available. In his mind it wasnt an emergency..yet. The Riverside Sheriffs Department stated that the original cell data no longer existed and the 10.6-mile number apparently came from a single technician and could have been a clerical error. At some point his phone connects briefly. When they failed to find Bill, Pritchett returned to the lot where he was soon joined by police from the neighboring county and volunteer searchers. The view from the upper reaches of Quail Mountain is vast, and its hard to be lost when much of the park and its roads are visible. But hey and follow on searchers found no trace. I think Bill took some sort of stumble, perhaps aggravated by dehydration, and suffered an incapacitating ambulatory injury. By any normal standard its not a good option, but this is far from normal and its realistically his only option. Most cellphones ping radio towers on a regular basis when they are used for a call, message or to access the internet The ping can be used to estimate the distance from a tower and hence to triangulate the location of the cell user. According to a 2018 article in the New York Times,Ewasko was an avid hiker and Vietnam vet whotraveled by himselffrom his home in suburban Atlanta to Joshua Tree andhe planned to hike for several days. The light blue line is the 10.6 mile radius from the Serin Drive cell tower. And by definition, missing people are always found in the last place someone thinks to look. My thinking is that he attempted something that none of us have yet thought of in our wildest imaginings, and possibly came close to pulling it off. An initial search was called off after a week. I last did a posting with my current thoughts way back in January of 2013 after only 43 search attempts. The thing I remember the most, Pylman said, was the frustration of: How can this be? To him, and the knowledge he had available, it made more sense than returning to his vehicle. An extensive search turned up no sign of him. With that in mind Ive always tried to be respectful and circumspect in putting out any theories of how Bill may have met his end. The ping distance, when figuring in the bounce path length, comes out about right. Volunteers were already arriving from throughout Southern California, and an incident command post was created at Cap Rock. I state this because upon reaching any portion of the Smith Water Canyon rim he would have been in an area of excellent cell phone coverage. After being joined by another ranger and the CHP helicopter, Pritchett drove up Juniper Flats Road, an old jeep trail now closed to the public but often used by hikers heading for Quail Mountain, calling to Ewasko via a loudspeaker. By this I mean something curtailing his ability to cover considerable ground. Previous search tracks are shown in red and black, and the Serin Tower 10.6 mile radius in light blue.If Bill's on the southerly slopes it would have to be lower than the green area of very good cell coverage but in an overlooked spot. By May of 2016 the area of interest had been searched very well, tracks in red, suggesting an accident on descent might not be the correct scenario. How can we have so much information about where he was going to go, or at least where he said he was going to go why cant we find him?, Careys Castle was only one of several locations on Ewaskos itinerary. How could that be the case? Mahood had cellphone records which showed that at 6:50 a.m. on Sunday, June 27, 2010, three days after Ewasko last spoke with Mary Winston, his phone communicated with a Verizon tower just outside the parks northwestern edge, above the town of Yucca Valley. He is responsible for the discovery of the Death Valley Germans (Egbert Rimkus, Georg Weber, Cornelia Meyer, Max Meyer). Upon their return, several of the searchers pointed towards a nearby ridge and said that they could see lights. Given the temperatures, he may have begun to experience initial symptoms of dehydration and realized he could be in a small predicament by overextending himself. A friend of Doggett's had previously reported that he had gone hiking alone and could not be reached by phone. After performing signal tests throughout Covington Flats, however, Melson found that his numerous attempts to mark a specific distance from the Verizon tower revealed large margins of error. a New York man was found dead on Bear Creek Trail near La Quinta. Winston, reached Wednesday night by The Desert Sun, declined to talk about Ewasko. There, hikers have collectively posted many hundreds of times about Ewasko since May 2012. The nearest salvation, Park Road, is 3.5 miles away, invisible to Bill and impossible to reach in his dire condition. So heres the sequence of events I think seem to best fit what is known to date: Around 7 AM on Thursday June 24, Bill makes a cell call to David Rosso, the owner of the condo he was staying at, saying he was headed for Joshua Tree that day. This theory fit what was known at the time very well and directed many of my (and others) search attempts since. According to park Superintendent David A. Smith,the remains wereold and are being investigated as a homicide by the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department. And if he took the fairly obvious route descending a very pronounced side canyon, it wasnt really awful (such things are relative in Smith Water Canyon). The station did not say how it learned that. So Bill set off for Smith Water Canyon and the water he expected to find. So all that can be said is Bill arrived sometime after 10:20 AM. It would make for a long day and he would miss his dinner schedule at Pappy and Harriets in Pioneertown but it could be an epic adventure. The second belief Ive developed is that subjects who arent immediately found by SAR personnel usually do something unexpected or unanticipated by searchers. I will confess that in a wonderful display of hubris I even named one of our first search plans for the area Endgame. Since this is a junction of all trails in the area, it offered no guidance as to where Bill might have gone next. Guidebooks written before our multiyear drought make it sound like theres much more water then there actually is, especially in summer months. This may have been occurring with multiple iterations in the Ewasko case. Even so, he may have been tempted to push further on to just reach the top of the ridge because it appears so close (I have made these sort of questionable decisions many times myself). They were only able to cover part of the area before the light faded. "We have no confirmation of who the deceased is and will not be releasing any information about the identity until our Coroner's Division has completed their process and the next of kin has been notified," she said in an e-mail. Based upon Bills stated location, with normal driving and no detours, he should have ended up at the Juniper Flats trailhead around 9:15 AM. And from what limited data we could uncover, it appeared Verizons reported distance of 10.6 miles was likely accurate. On his way to the park the morning of June 24, Bill made two phone calls, reporting that he was on Interstate 10 near Palm Desert, a location subsequently verified by cell phone records. We assumed he did something a bit unexpected and ended up in an unsearched area so we set about clearing them. A hiker arriving at the trailhead at 10:20 AM saw no other vehicles, but saw Bills car when he returned from his hike around 5:30 PM. The Ewasko search thread hosted by the Mount San Jacinto Outdoor Recreation forum. ", Mahood told The Desert Sun on Wednesday that he had researched the GPS tracking of the sheriff's helicopter that responded to the report of remains found on Wednesday morning. Dave Pylman, the parks deputy planning chief and a former executive director of Friends of Joshua Tree, a climbing-advocacy group, as well as a 19-year veteran of Joshua Tree Search and Rescue, was put in charge of routes, teams and search areas. Yet initial searchers, who would have quickly found a subject in this situation, found no trace. The first call was to the owner of Bills condo. Mahood has published many posts on his blog about Ewaskos disappearance. From this point to the top of Quail Mountain there are no marked/signed trails, only cross country routes some of which have been published. How high he could have crawled its hard to say, but Id guess something less than a few hundred feet. Had Ewasko finally reached a high-enough point where he was confident he could get a clear signal but his battery had given up on him? But then, at some point, at least half way down, things went seriously wrong. Your California Privacy Rights / Privacy Policy. It would have taken him at least an hour to cover the 1.5 miles to the canyon rim, maybe double that as dehydration symptoms increased across the rugged terrain. It appears very close and if checked on a map its only 1.5 miles to the rim of the canyon. And while the 10.6 mile distance is closer to the northerly slopes than the searched southerly ones, their orientation is not line of sight to the cell tower so it shouldnt be pingable from there. Evidence like where his car was, where he would have been hiking, accuracy of the cell ping, where hes known to not be, things like that. But while it looks simple, its a 900 climb in 1.3 miles to reach the top of the ridgeline Quail Mountain is a part of. He was supposed to return to his vehicle and call his girlfriend at 5.00 pm, but he never did. I should point out that one of the symptoms of dehydration is confusion and impaired judgment (Sadly, I can speak from personal experience on this). While we now know the conclusion, we may likely never know any details unless Bill left behind any surviving notes as to his predicament. He could turn around any time if he got too thirsty or too hot. If one gives high weight to the accuracy of the cell ping distance there is a scenario which fits pretty much all that is known about the case and explains why no trace has yet been found. Although it is a cross country route, from this viewpoint it appears rather reasonable. But he had absolutely no margin for error. 'Something RichardFeynman described as a 'failure of imagination.' He has to know that at this point he likely has only hours left to him. At this point I think Bill did something none of the initial searchers could have foreseen. This is why lost people usually travel downhill as its easier. Clearly no one would make the grueling descent into Smith Water then start up the other side, would they? This suggests whatever accident occurred, it was in the lower half of the descent to the Smith Water Canyon bottom. Winston reported him missing the next day. After more than a year of hiking in the Death Valley area, on November 12, 2009, Mahood and another searcher found the remains of the German family who disappeared in Death Valley 13 years earlier on 23 July 1996. Pritchett dropped off two teams of searchers to cover the California Riding and Hiking Trail, which runs roughly parallel to Juniper Flats Road and recrosses it near Juniper Flat, and Stubbe Springs Trail, a side loop trail. At first, he said, Ewasko appeared to be a typical lost tourist: someone who goes out by himself, encounters a problem of some sort, fails to report back at a prearranged time and eventually finds his way back to known territory. One of the itineraries had listed for that Thursday Thousand Palms, Joshua Tree all day, Lost Horse Mountain which added little to the information already at hand. So two people looking at the same evidence may come to very different conclusions depending on how important they think each data point is. awallet was found with the remains with the name of Bill Ewasko. However with the mountain directly in front, the frontal approach looks easiest. While a cell signal could have been a salvation, he had a much more urgent need for water, which he knew existed at the bottom of Smith Water. Heres the thing about Smith Water Canyon..There IS water there year round, but you have to know where to look. This means that Bills car arrived at the parking lot no earlier than 10:20 am, leaving, at minimum, a nearly 2 hour gap from his last phone call. In fact the path length is better for the northerly slopes than most places on the southerly slopes. He also saw a single line of fresh boot tracks going up the old Juniper Flats road. Although Mahood participated in the official search for Bill Ewasko, helping to clear the region around Quail Mountain, the case became an obsession and he has become determined to find Bill.