A team of elite mountaineers familiar with routes on Mount Rainier and avoiding avalanches headed on Thursday to look for two overdue parties in Mount Rainier National Park.

As the search for a missing 66-year-old snowshoer in the backcountry of Mount Rainier National Park moved into its third cold, snowy day, more than a few of those involved began to fear the worst. But in the end, they found Yong Chun Kim able to walk and in no immediate need of medical care.

More than two dozen personnel were searching an area near Paradise in Mount Rainier National Park on Sunday for a missing snowshoer who failed to return from an afternoon outing the day before.

We like to think that national parks are just that: serene, picturesque "parks" where we can, if only for a moment or two, escape the ugliness and stress of the world beyond their borders. But as the New Year's Day shooting at Mount Rainier National Park that left a young ranger dead proved only too well, national parks are not always the sanctuaries we'd like them to be.