OLYMPIC NATIONAL PARK – The cost of a four-day search for missing hiker Mary O’Brien earlier this month will probably total more than $100,000 once all the bills are in.
The cost estimate was just shy of $99,000 late last week, said Barb Maynes, spokeswoman for Olympic National Park.
The amount is expected to hit $102,000 after all of the bills are totaled, she said.
O’Brien, a 45-year-old teacher from Arlington, Mass., walked out of Olympic National Park on July 7 after five nights alone in the back country. She was tired and her shins were covered in scratches from days of hiking off trails through dense forest, but she was otherwise unharmed.
She had been reported overdue on July 3 and the search had begun the following day, beginning from her campsite in the Sol Duc Campground.
The first day, 10 people searched.
By Saturday, two helicopters, an airplane with heat-detecting cameras, three tracking dogs, a technical mountaineering rescue team and a swift-water dive team were recruited by the park.
The effort involved 50 searchers, including three relatives, and focused on the trails and snow fields in the Sol Duc and Seven Lakes Basin.
