Man’s desperate call to wife leads rescuers to group stuck on snowy Utah trail, cops say

A man made a desperate call to his wife back home in Arizona after his group of six and their dog became trapped on a snowy and muddy Utah trail, rescuers said.

Rescuers responded to the group at 5:37 p.m. March 15 on the Thompson Canyon, Polar Mesa trail, the Grand County Sheriff’s Search and Rescue said in a March 20 Facebook post.

The Thompson Canyon, Polar Mesa trail is over 27 miles long near Moab.

The group attempted to drive on the trail while it snowed and rained. When they got their vehicles stuck in deep mud, one man called his wife in Arizona for help, rescuers said.

They managed to get out of the mud and drive farther along the trail.

“They attempted to continue up the trail by winching the lead vehicle forward, with the other vehicles following in its path,” rescuers said in the post.

That’s when they got stranded in 3 feet of snow, rescuers said.

Rescuers said they tried to reach the group from both ends of the trail, and they parked two extreme terrain vehicles nearby.

Ultimately, a volunteer rescuer reached the group in a “six-wheel-drive Pinzgauer all-terrain military utility vehicle” from Onion Creek. He had to drive through miles of “sloppy mud” that was a foot deep, rescuers said.

The rescue took nearly eight hours.

Moab is in eastern Utah, about 235 miles southeast of Salt Lake City.

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