UPDATE: Skier Still Missing on Mt. Rainier, WA After Falling Through Crevasse Into Creek on July 3rd, 2017

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Dmitri Pajitnov

 

BACKGROUND INFO:

“Our beloved friend, son, brother, ski patrol Dmitri Pajitnov disappeared on Mt Rainier on July 3, 2017 at 16:15 in Washington state. He fell into a creek under a layer of ice. Search works by the National Park Service were terminated the next day, July 4th. We are looking for any help in order to resume the active search.

Dmitri is a highly experienced skier and mountaineer, we have the foresight that he is still alive and there are chances to save him.  A human can survive without food and water for two weeks so why would we stop the search after one day. We need all your help to persuade the relevant government bodies to resume the active search.

Dmitri worked as EMT and Ski Patrol saving lives so please help save his”.Change.org

Dmitri Pajitnov’s family is looking for people to sign this petition to continue the search for the missing skier.

Change.org

14,411′ Mt. Rainier, WA.

 LATEST UPDATE:

6TH OF JULY, 2017 — We just spoke with Superintendent Randy King who oversees Mt Rainier National Park. It’s our understanding that the incident commander and family liaison are accountable to Superintendent King.

He explained that they regard the chance of survivability to be essentially negligible. He recapped that Dmitri’s partner Jason is skilled and searched for 2 hours, then they had skilled mountaineers from the park searching that day and then a helicopter the next day. The area where he fell, a crevasse into running water, is very dangerous and so, according to Randy, they have to really evaluate the risk of putting their own people in danger for additional rescue. He indicated they do want to find him and are on what is called a Continuous Limited Search. He didn’t know if the exact area is one that fully unfreezes and so didn’t have a good sense of when or if they will be able to recover his remains.

By the time we spoke with him around 9am, Senator Cantwell’s office and Congressman Reichart’s office had already called King’s office. It is safe to say this is clearly on King’s radar. King indicated he will return the calls to those offices today and that we could call back later today to get any update.

Overall he seemed concerned and thoughtful but measured and sober as one would expect from someone who has dealt with numerous tragedies over his decades of experience overseeing national parks. 

We explained that Dmitri has considerable survival skills as an EMT and someone in medical school. Randy also added that he knew Dmitri was also Ski Patrol. Our point was that his odds of survival ought to be higher given this. So we asked that he do whatever he would do if it was his own son. Literally, “Imagine your own son was down there. We’re just asking you to do for Dmitri what you would then do for your son.” He again recapped the risk to the safety of his own staff in that dangerous area. So we said “Look, imagine you have two sons, one on the rescue crew and one in the crevasse – we’re just asking to make sure you’ve done all you can in a situation like that”. He understood and wanted us to reiterate to the family that they are already handling it that way. He also reiterated that they regard the odds of survivability to be negligible which is what dampens the benefit of putting others at risk of further tragedy. Finally we mentioned that if cost is an issue for further efforts that it would be no problem to compensate the park and he explained three times that it is never about money in these situations. –  Change.org


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