Stymied by blizzard conditions and deep drifts of fresh snow Sunday, searchers near Paradise were unable to find a Tacoma man missing after falling down a steep slope during a Saturday snowshoe hike.
The search for 66-year-old Yong Chun Kim was suspended at 5 p.m. as the sun set on the south side of Mount Rainier National Park, but it will continue this morning at first light, park spokeswoman Lee Taylor said.
The road above Longmire will be closed today to keep visitors from interfering and so the park can dedicate more resources to the search.
“Time is of the essence in a search like this and we want to focus everything we’ve got on finding Yong Chun Kim,” park superintendent Randy King said in a prepared statement.
Kim, a strong hiker with more than a decade of snowshoeing experience, reportedly was leading a snowshoe trip Saturday for a Tacoma-based hiking club when he fell down a steep slope.
Instead of climbing back up the slope, he planned to hike around and meet the group farther down the trail. The group returned to Paradise at 2 p.m. Kim was carrying a radio and last contacted the group at 2:30, stating that he was OK and on his way.
When he did not arrive by 3 p.m., park service officials launched a search that lasted until 9 p.m.
When the search resumed Sunday morning it included 45 people consisting of park rangers and volunteers from the Tacoma, Seattle and Everett mountain rescue units. Three teams from German Shepherd Search Dogs of Washington State and the PistenBully groomer used for plowing and maintaining the snowplay area were also used.
The inclement weather prevented an aerial search.
Members of the hiking party led searchers back to the spot where Kim fell. Based on descriptions, Taylor said it sounded as if the fall happened near the popular Skyline Trail above Paradise.
On Sunday afternoon, searchers spoke with backcountry campers who reported seeing tracks heading down the Stevens Creek drainage, a common wrong way route for lost climbers and snowshoers. The drainage leads to Stevens Canyon Road, which is closed for the winter.
Pinpointing the fall area and the tracks into the drainage led searchers to shift their hunt to the west of where they were previously looking, Taylor said.
Conditions around Paradise have been harsh, with temperatures in the teens and winds gusting as high as 50 mph. Searchers were also contending with drifts of new snow as deep as 30 inches.
Conditions are not expected to improve today. The Northwest Weather and Avalanche Center’s avalanche forecast is for “considerable danger above 5,000 feet” today, just as it was Sunday. The National Weather Service was predicting 2-4 inches of new snow overnight and again this afternoon in the Central Cascades.
Kim was well equipped for his day hike according to park reports, but didn’t have overnight camping gear or experience with snow camping.
Members of Saturday’s snowshoeing party and members of Kim’s family were gathered at Longmire on Sunday following the search updates, Taylor said.
This isn’t the first search for a snowshoer lost in the Paradise area in recent months. On Dec. 13, a solo snowshoer from New York was found dead, apparently of hypothermia, near Paradise.
Craig Hill: 253-597-8497
craig.hill@thenewstribune.com
READ MORE: Get the latest updates on the search here.
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