North Cascades National Park entrance / Wikipedia Commons

A hiker who went missing at the end of July in Washington’s North Cascades National Park was found, alive, but barely, on August 30, after a month stranded in the elements.

Robert Schock, 39, was found by members of the Pacific Northwest Trail Association (PNTA), working to repair damaged sections of trail in the Chilliwack Basin. Schock had last been seen hiking the Chilliwack River Trail with his dog on July 31. He was equipped only with light day hiking gear. 

Schock was reported missing on August 5, after his dog had turned up alone on the trail the day before, about 8 miles from the Hannegan Pass Trailhead, where Schock had parked his vehicle. 

According to CNN, Park rangers and sheriff deputies began a ground search on August 7. The US Border Patrol joined the rescue efforts a week later, flying an air search of the Chilliwack Basin, but found no signs of Schock. 

On August 30, a PNTA trail crew working near the Chilliwack River heard faint calls for help. When they investigated they found Schock, alive, but in dire straits. A helicopter crew airlifted Schock to a nearby hospital where he was stabilized.

“When our crew found Robert, he was able to communicate to them that he had been immobile, stuck in that exact spot for approximately two weeks,” wrote Jeff Kish, the director of PNTA, in a Facebook post. 

Schock’s mother, Jan Thompson, who’d initially reported her son missing weeks before, said she’d expected the worst when rangers called to tell her they’d found Schock alive. “We’re really in disbelief about this,” she told the Cascadia Daily News. 

According to Thompson, Schock explained he’d become disoriented and confused by what he described as changes in the Chilliwack River Trail after a river crossing. Park authorities informed her on August 4 they'd found Schock's dog. Thompson reported him missing the following day.

Kish didn’t reveal details of Schock’s condition other than to say, “it is the belief of those who came to be involved in the rescue that Robert may have only had another day left in him before the outcome of his discovery would have been much more tragic.”

Members of the trail crew have Wilderness First Responder training, but aren’t prepared to administer life-saving aid to people as malnourished and weakened as Schock was when they found him. 

“What they did this weekend was above and beyond anything that I think anyone could have reasonably expected of them,” Kish wrote. “They saved Robert’s life against improbable odds, and at great psychological toll.”