During its annual camping trip, Maricopa’s Cub Scout Pack 389 goes over lessons like the buddy system and flag-retirement. These trips bring all levels of scouts together and their parents to experience the outdoors and form strong bonds. This year’s campout Oct. 5-6 took place at Woods Canyon Lake in Payson.
Pack 389 had to put their skills and training to the test when they learned of a missing girl in the area.
Scoutmaster Adam Geron was the first to receive information about a missing girl after their flag-retirement ceremony Saturday night.
“Walt, who was the host of our campground at Woods Canyon Lake, came up with a gentleman and said they needed to inform us there was a lost 13-year-old girl,” Geron said. “I essentially just turned around to everybody there and told them we have a problem, we have an issue, we need to help.”
Parents and scouts all agreed and were out searching within minutes. Geron said they had gone over a buddy system during this trip and he was proud to see the scouts implement it so quickly for the situation.
An obstacle in the search was the fact the young girl they were looking for was reported as being non-verbal.
The Hoke-Northup family, who ultimately found the girl about a mile away, explained their strategy and triumph during the search.
“We knew she was non-verbal, so we could shout to her, but she couldn’t shout back,” said Cub Scout parent Crystal Hoke-Northup. “But we figured she could hear us and walk towards us if we were calling her name.”
Their group consisted of Crystal and her two children, Airiana and Reed. Reed is a 9-year-old Bear Scout. The family went through a rocky creek and came to an open area with scattered trees.
Crystal said she was ready to turn back with night quickly approaching and no sign of the girl.
“But then, my daughter, she goes, “What’s that? There’s a person up there!”
Sure enough, it was the missing girl. They approached and met with the girl and let her know she was safe. According to her family, the girl had wandered off looking for firewood along the creek near their site and hadn’t realized how far she had gone. When she was found by scouts, she was still carrying a handful of firewood.
“We went looking and we went to the right spot at the right time,” Reed said. “I was ready to use my high-pitched scream to let everyone know that we found her. I used everything from my head to the bottom of me to get her back safe.”
Other scouts and parents met up with Crystal, Reed and Airiana to help get the girl back to their campground.
“We sat her down at the campfire to warm her up; we knew the poor thing was probably freezing,” Crystal said.
Geron drove down to the lost girl’s campsite and saw fire rescue was still filling out paperwork, not having started their search yet. He informed them the girl was found and she was being taken care of at their camp.
“In about 45 minutes we had found her,” Geron said. “Just good planning and teaching, knowing what to do allowed to potentially save her life, I don’t know.”
The family reunited with their daughter and thanked Pack 389 for their aid in locating her.
This story appears in the November issue of InMaricopa.
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