Drone team critical in safely locating two missing Sublette County women

PINEDALE - Two local women are alive and well thanks to the work of the Sublette County Sheriff's Office Unmanned Aircraft Systems drone pilots Sgt. Travis Bingham and Deputy Scott Campbell, other SCSO deputies and volunteers with Tip Top Search and Rescue.

In two separate incidents about 23 days apart, two adult women – both with intellectual or developmental disabilities – disappeared from their homes ill-equipped for the snow and ice.

One woman traveled three miles across Pine Creek, the New Fork River and Duck Creek in the dark, while the other left barefoot prints in the snow through Boyd Skinner Park that stopped at the edge of Pine Creek.

As deputies and Sublette County Sheriff KC Lehr tracked the women on the ground, Bingham and Campbell deployed the drones.

They managed to catch up to both women from the air, coordinate their locations in real time, and relay that information to the deputies searching on foot, ultimately leading to the safe rescues of both women before they succumbed to hypothermia.

At 9:39 a.m. on March 7, a woman entered the Sublette County Sheriff's Office in Pinedale and reported her adult daughter with special needs had walked out of her apartment without being properly dressed for the weather.

Deputies immediately began canvassing and picked up a set of barefoot prints through the town's skatepark that led over ice and through knee-deep snow banks of Boyd Skinner Park and stopped at the edge of Pine Creek.

Bingham sent out an alert through Ring doorbells asking folks to check their footage and keep an eye out for the missing woman, and five minutes later, he and Campbell deployed the drones.

As the drones scanned the park and its surroundings, a resident on South Lincoln Avenue contacted dispatch with a tip about a wet-looking woman who had stopped and asked her for a sweater. She told dispatch that she had given the woman a distinctive green sweater.

Dispatch relayed the tip to the canvassing deputies and from the air, Bingham's drone quickly located the woman wearing the green sweater.

She had already traveled a block along South Lincoln Avenue. She turned onto Madison, noticed the drone, and ran into a backyard where she hid under the homeowner's trampoline.

Bingham relayed her precise location under the trampoline to deputies who were able to make contact with her and, with the help of her mom, coax her out from underneath.

She was wet from the knees down and had been out in the 30-degree weather for an hour. She was evaluated by EMS and sent home safely with her mom.

Over the rivers and into the night

At 11 p.m. on Feb. 19, as temperatures hovered around 20 degrees, another "disabled but pretty high functioning" young woman left her home near Boyd Skinner Park.

She had a 10- to 15-minute head start before the call came into the SCSO, during which deputies immediately began canvassing.

Following a March 7 interview with the Pinedale Roundup, the SCSO released a portion of the 911 call and drone footage from the search.

"We think she's running toward the park," the caller tells the dispatcher in the Feb. 19 call, adding, "She's never done this before."

Deputies search the area on foot and report seeing "fresh footprints in the snow" over the radio.

As SCSO Deputy and drone pilot Scott Campbell watches this footage on a live stream, he notifies searchers on the ground that he's spotted a human subject in the field. It's the missing woman they've been desperately searching for in 20-degree weather.

At 11:25 p.m., someone requests dispatchers "get a hold of the drone team please."

Campbell launches the SCSO's thermal drone from near Stone Trail and Granite Lane in Pinedale.

Later, as the drone flies over sagebrush far from any homes or houses, Campbell's voice comes over the radio to ask searchers on the ground, "10-28 is that you that I'm over?"

"Negative, we don't hear your drone at all," deputies on the ground reply.

"I'm over a human subject walking ... I'm following," Campbell says.

The drone footage depicts the young woman, her hair over her left shoulder, as she ambles through snow-covered sage in the darkness. She squats down into the snow and seems to struggle as she stands back up. At one point, she takes off running.

Her shoulders and head appear red from her body's heat signature, a stark and undeniable contrast to the wildlife also visible in the darkness surrounding her.

Deputies and volunteers from Tip Top Search and Rescue are still far from reaching the woman, as depicted in the footage when the drone must make a return flight for a battery change. All the while, the pilot continues coordinating with the searchers on foot, giving movement and directional updates, until someone breathlessly breaks through with, "All units, I think I have a visual."

As the publicly released drone footage ends, search and rescue make contact with the woman three miles from her home, soaking wet from having crossed Pine Creek, the New Fork River and Duck Creek in the 20-degree weather.

EMS on scene determines she has not sustained any injuries from exposure and she returns home safely.

Lifesaving technology

Lehr told the Roundup, "If we didn't have the thermal imaging technology with the drone, that individual would have gone into hypothermia and we wouldn't have this good outcome." Bingham added, "We can call these two wins."

The office has multiple drones with varying capabilities and plans to obtain more specifically rated for flying indoors.

Speaking about William Lowrey, the barricaded subject who engaged in a 32-hour standoff with the Sheridan Police Department and killed Sgt. Nevada Krinkee on Feb. 27, Lehr and Bingham explained drones capable of indoor flight could be valuable tools to help ensure responder safety in standoffs and hostage situations.

"We've used the drones in more applications than I thought we ever would," Lehr said, "Search and rescues, fleeing suspects, diagramming crashes and mapping crime scenes can all be done with these drones."