A drone equipped with an infrared heat sensor joined the search on Saturday, Oct. 10, for a 75-year-old woman missing since Thursday morning in the Wallowa Mountains about 28 air miles northeast of Baker City.
A member of the Union County Search and Rescue team flew the drone, Ashley McClay, public information officer for the Baker County Sheriff’s Office, said on Sunday morning, Oct. 11.
Searchers haven’t found any sign of Rita Demarinis, who lives in North Plains, near Hillsboro, and was camping with numerous relatives on a hunting trip at Two Color Campground beside Eagle Creek.
Searchers on Saturday included members of the sheriff’s offices and search and rescue teams in both Baker and Union counties, and members of the Union Hotshot firefighting crew, McClay said.
The search continued on Sunday.
Daisy, the Baker County Sheriff’s office’s trained tracking hound, has also participated.
The ground search has focused on the Two Color Campground, where Demarinis was last seen, and the Boulder Park/Main Eagle Trailhead area, McClay said.
Rita Demarinis is 5-foot-2 and weighs about 115 pounds, according to the sheriff’s office.
She was last seen wearing a dark blue plaid shirt and blue jeans, and she might have a dark gray Carhartt jacket. Demarinis has health issues and is considered “endangered” as a result, according to the sheriff’s office.
McClay said Demarinis has limited mobility, but she didn’t have specific details about how far her family believed she could walk.
McClay said she has called hospitals between Caldwell, Idaho, and Portland in case someone might have picked up Demarinis and taken her to a hospital, but none had a record of a patient matching Demarinis’ description.
Officials are also checking permits that hikers filled out before entering the Eagle Cap Wilderness, a few miles north of the campground, to try to talk with hikers who might have seen Demarinis.
Demarinis was camping at Two Color Campground, along Forest Road 7755, which runs along Eagle Creek and ends at Main Eagle Trailhead and Boulder Park, McClay said. The site is about 28 air miles northeast of Baker City. Some of the group are hunters, McClay said.
The campground is about half a mile north of the intersection of Road 7755 and Road 77, the Eagle Creek Road, and about 3.2 miles south of the Main Eagle Trailhead.
Relatives called the sheriff’s office about 11:30 a.m. Thursday after the two dogs that were with Demarinis when she walked away from the campground, about two hours earlier, returned without her.
She said relatives searched for Demarinis, along with seven members of the Search and Rescue team and four employees from the sheriff’s office.
Temperatures have dropped since Thursday after a cold front passed through late Friday.
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