Michelle Vanek - No Longer Missing * Search & Rescue Debrief 20260102 * Mount (Mt) of the Holy Cross

This is my 14 minute vlog about the day that I hiked to the top of Mt. of the Holy Cross near Vail, Colorado. That day was September 24, 2005. This turned out to be the day that Michelle Vanek, a mother of four, went missing while hiking on the same mountain.

The vlog parallels my hike with Michelle's. Her final recovery, and the closure of her missing person case wouldn't be solved for two decades, and her remains were finally found by a team of all-women SAR volunteers.

I was personally affected by her story, so the next year in 2006, I volunteered for my local search and rescue team, AVSAR (Alamosa Volunteer Search And Rescue). After years of volunteerism, as an English teacher I turned several of my incident reports into narratives to help others avoid becoming SAR statistics, especially in the Sange de Cristo Mountains.

One of my book's chapters details the case of a similar case to Michelle's. Mark Stice backpacked into the Crestone Group and was never heard from again. Similar to Michelle's case, I still hope that evidence is found of Mark's final resting place so that his widow and daughters can have final closure.

Here are links I used while making this video:

5280 Article https://5280.com/she-disappeared-on-a...

Holy Cross Routes https://www.14ers.com/routelist.php?p...

FBI https://apps.colorado.gov/apps/coldca...

My summit video    • Mt. Holy Cross Summit Sept. 2005  

Colorado Sun Article https://coloradosun.com/2025/10/13/mi...

My book (all dividends are donated to SAR): https://www.simonandschuster.com/book...