She’s got eagle eyes and it has saved a hiker’s life.
A woman was riding on Colorado’s Durango and Silverton Narrow Gauge Train on Monday, October 10, and she spotted a distressed person near a riverbed waving frantically to the train.
The Durango Herald said that it was next to impossible for a human to see a person because of the very limited angle that was necessary.
The Office of Emergency Management, San Juan County Colorado said in a Facebook post that after the woman saw the person in distress, she quickly notified the train staff who started an emergency response.
The train staff notified Delton Henry who was following behind the train in the inspection motor car. He pulled up to where the woman was supposedly seen and called to her from across the riverbed. The woman had a broken leg and couldn’t move.
A train superintendent for the train called 911 and got help from the San Juan County Search and Rescue.
“The 911 operator very quickly asked me if we had the name of the individual,” D&SNG Superintendent Darren Whitten told The Durango Herald. “She explained to me that there had been a hiker that was overdue and had been missing since Saturday, and that her parents had been frantically looking for her.”
The woman who was found was twenty-something and was from Aztec, New Mexico. She had been missing for two days. She had fallen off of a 90-foot cliff while taking pictures. She broke her leg and suffered a concussion, having no idea how long she was unconscious. To stay warm at night, she tucked herself into a cliff face.
Her survival is nothing short of a miracle. At night, temperatures can get below 20 degrees and she was only wearing a tank top.
The area is also known to have both wolves and mountain lions.
“It’s an amazing feat that she survived two nights in the cold snap we are having,” said emergency management spokeswoman DeAnne Gallegos. “Our team thought that was pretty miraculous. And that she was aware the train was still running, and managed with a broken leg to crawl to the bank of the river to try and signal them.”
The rescue was a great effort that involved a lot of people coming together to help one injured hiker. But it all started with one eagle-eyed person who was paying attention, saw something, and said something.
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