SMSR Sending Additional Rescuers to Help Locate Missing Hiker Near San Jacinto Peak

Speaking from their Sierra Madre headquarters late Sunday evening, Sierra Madre Search and Rescue Team Member Tommy Ingulfsen said SMSR would be sending five additional members of the all-volunteer organization toward Mt. Jacinto State Park early Monday morning to aid in the efforts to locate a missing hiker. Ingulfsen said the second wave of team members would depart Sierra Madre at 4:00 a.m. Monday morning. Currently, SMSR has nine team members working in the area, Ingulfsen said.

Those SMSR members are working alongside units from the Riverside Mountain Rescue Unit and the Riverside County Sheriffs Dept., among others. A state team specializing in backcountry ski mountaineering and assessing avalanche risk has also joined the search efforts, according to the California Emergency Management Agency.

Details from the SMSR rescuers were scarce late Sunday, but Ingulfsen did say that conditions were extremely difficult due to the cold weather and fresh snow following a storm that swept across Southern California on Friday and Saturday.

"I know that it's very cold and there's a lot of snow on the ground," Ingulfsen told Patch. "Rescuers are using snow shoes because of the depth."

On Sunday, Feb. 20, to find a missing 57-year-old Redondo Beach man who set out Saturday morning with a permit to climb 10,834-foot San Jacinto Peak from the Palm Springs Aerial Tramway's mountain station. Brian Carrico, 57, departed the lower tram station Saturday morning, Riverside County sheriff's officials said.

A command post was in place Sunday just before noon at the mountain station, a Tramway official told Patch.

Stay with Patch for the latest on the search and rescue effort.