Kittitas County, WA -02/08/2012 – The Kittitas County Sheriff’s Office located a missing snowmiler shortly around 3 PM today about 5 miles from where he was last seen.
KITTCOM (Kittitas County Emergency Communication Center) received a call yesterday, at 6:08 p.m. Wednesday evening reporting 73 year old Howard (Hal) Umland of Ellensburg, WA as an overdue snowmobiler. According to the Reporting Party, Howard Umland was last seen approximately 8-10 miles up Reecer Creek Rd on the groomed trail. He was riding with 4 others when he became separated, and was considered “somewhat familiar with the area.”
Kittitas County S&R Volunteers were paged out at 7:41 p.m., search operations were suspended at 2:00 a.m. and resumed again at 7:00 am this morning. Searchers located his snowmobile abandoned near the Nanum drainage at about 1:30 PM. Ground teams followed his foot prints and located him about 2 miles from his snowmobile.
He was in good condition and is being transported out at this time without injuries.
