MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — During the season of hope, a West Virginia family clings tightly to it as they spend the Christmas holiday without a loved one.
Carl Crumrine, 69, of Buckhannon has been missing since October 14th. That morning he left a hunting camp in Summit County, Utah for a day of elk hunting and never returned. Numerous searches since then have yielded few clues as to his whereabouts.
“Everybody is just keeping a positive attitude and holding on to hope,” said his son Paul Crumrine of Morgantown.
Paul was with search teams in Utah in the days which followed his dad’s disappearance. Searchers were eventually forced off the mountain when the first snow of the season set in. Now in the final week of December, the search is in what Crumrine says is termed “winter activity.”
“The snow is compacted and it’s very hard to go up in there with anything other than snowmobiles. When they can there have also been aerial searches by chopper. They’re looking for any signs of where he might have been, like a campfire,” he said.
Most recently the search team was granted permission to extend the search into neighboring Wyoming in case the elder Crumrine was able to make it that far and not realize his whereabouts. According to his son the state line in the area is an open power line right of way, which likely would have given his father something to follow to civilization, unless he had crossed it at night and not realized it was there.
“He could be in a cave, there could be an abandoned cabin up there. He’s got everything he needs to survive. He could shoot game for food and there are other ways of gathering food. He definitely could be up there, we just don’t know,” Paul said.
He said the family is trying to put on the best face they can and keep a positive outlook. But it becomes harder as each day passes and especially at a time when attention turns to family and holiday traditions and there’s one less in the group.
“I wake up every morning trying to be positive. Helping kids and helping others has been a real key for me and it keeps my mind off of things, knowing this may take a while before we find him,” he said.
A GoFundMe site generated donations soon after Carl’s disappearance to pay the travel expenses for Paul and his sister Danielle to go to Utah and be part of the search effort. About $550 leftover in the fund this week was donated to the Summit County Search & Rescue in appreciation for their efforts to find their father.
Utah authorities say the winter activities status of the search is likely going to be in place until at least April when the mountain thaws enough to allow a return to normal foot and canine searches of the remote region.