CASART - 9th Activation

NORWAY SEARCH & RECOVERY
Herkimer County, NY 10/24-29/05

CASART was notified on Sunday 10/23/05 by the NYSFEDSAR to activate the team for 7:00a.m. Monday 10/24/05.  Type III, Type II and Crew Bosses had been requested by NYS Forest Rangers to search for Lawrence (Larry) Brown or subject a white male age 68 with a Bi-Polar disorder.  The subject was last seen around 9:00a.m. on Saturday 10/22/05 leaving his cabin in the vicinity of Norway, NY in Southern Herkimer County wearing a green and black plaid wool jacket, green wool ball cap and kaki pants.  He was going to walk his property lines (500 acres) because of a property line dispute he was having with a neighbor who was in the process of logging his property.  The subject was going to meet his two nephews who would transport him back to his cabin on ATVs.  The subject never arrived at the designated meeting point and after some searching on Saturday, the nephews reported the subject missing around 11:00a.m. on Sunday 10/23/05.  The Forest Rangers conducted Type I searches on Sunday 10/23/05 and requested volunteer SAR teams to join in the search on Monday 10/24/05.  State Police & volunteer K9 crews were used throughout most of the six day search, State Police helicopters were used on Monday 10/24/05 and Wednesday 10/26/05, A kayak and row boat were used to search Spruce Creek and Type II and Type III volunteer crews (some crews also included State Police) were used in grid searches.

The following twenty (21) CASART members reported to the Incident Command Post at the Norway Community Center and participated in from one to five days of the six day search: Doug Adams, Tina Brandt, Ellie Connick, Ron Dearlove, Gary Evans, Diana Huss, Jim Huss, Bruce Knudsen, Nancy Langham, Bob Liddle, Cheryl Lougeay, Ray Lougeay, Pete McCarthy, Judy Nevil, Greg O’Hara, Bonnie Petty, Roy Reehil, Bill Rockhill, Ray Schoeberlein, Eileen Tobin and Don Unsworth.

These team members endured nice weather on Monday, pouring rain all day on Tuesday, snow on the ground and on the trees on Wednesday (they were soaked and took Thursday off to dry out) and fairly nice weather on Friday and Saturday.  Terrain ranged from fairly gentle open hardwoods to dense mixed forest, some short steep sections covered with nasty thorny vines, flat swamp with standing water up to two feet deep and conifers so dense that they had to pry their way through.  On Saturday afternoon 10/29/05 Cheryl Lougeay, while making a sweep of Block 21 with a Type III crew made up of four other CASART members, two State Troopers and a Forest Ranger Crew Boss, discovered a critical clue on the ground, a white tissue.  This quickly led to the discovery of four cigarette buts (Kool Menthol the brand of cigarettes that were smoked by the subject).  A depression on the ground where someone had been sitting was also discovered and they knew the subject had been here.  This concentrated the search, and on their third sweep, two hours following this discovery, they found the body of the subject. 

A tremendous job was done by all of these members who distinguished CASART as a very professional and well equipped team.  Rangers commented on how well trained and disciplined they were.  Rangers used CASART radios when their radios didn’t work.  CASART GPS units were invaluable in pinpointing where they were in assigned blocks and in the precise location of the clues.  CASART team members were so disciplined in grid searches that the Forest Ranger Crew Bosses joined in on the line as fellow searchers rather than follow behind as Crew Bosses.

To find out more about the team or to get a membership application write to CASART at P.O. Box 143, Inlet, NY 13360, call us at 315-357-4381, visit our web site at www.casart.org, or send email to webmaster@casart.org.

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