Lessons learned from the latest lost Christmas tree hunters
Dad, kids rescued after getting lost on Christmas tree hunt
Family missing for three days used twigs to write ‘Help’ in snow
Associated Press
Published on: 12/19/07
Paradise, Calif. — A father and three children who vanished on a Christmas tree-cutting trip in the Northern California mountains were found alive Wednesday after huddling in a culvert for warmth during three days of heavy snow.
A California Highway Patrol helicopter crew spotted Frederick Dominguez waving his arms atop a small bridge and landed nearby, sinking into 2 feet of snow, flight officer David White said. White said the crew found the family on their last pass over the area as snow from another storm, even bigger than the first, started to fall heavily.
Hours later, after he had been checked at a hospital, Dominguez described three harrowing nights in the wild as he tried to keep his children from panicking and succumbing to the numbing cold.
“You just want your kids to be safe and you’re just praying, ‘God, keep my kids alive,'” he told reporters gathered at Feather River Hospital in Paradise.
The rescue came as their family and friends were starting to lose hope, with another storm moving in and beginning to dump yet more snow in the foothill region about 100 miles north of Sacramento.
