Miracle on the Mountain

About 20 feet separated Jacob and Josh as they corkscrewed their bodies over the rocks. Jacob led the way, twisting down a couple of boulders. The brothers couldn't see each other but yelled to keep track of their positions.

"Are you all right?" Jacob asked.

"I'm fine," Josh yelled.

"Meet me at the bottom," Jacob hollered back.

Josh yelled back, but his voice was faint. Jacob thought Josh was lagging behind so he slowed his pace and waited for Josh. But Josh never caught up.

"Josh?" Jacob called.

No answer.

"Josh?"

Silence.

Jacob panicked. He wondered if Josh had fallen and hurt himself.

Jacob chucked his daypack and walking sticks and darted back up the boulders. No Josh. Jacob zigzagged through a field of refrigerator-sized rocks. His brother was nowhere.

The frantic search threw Jacob even further off course. He lost the trail, and he couldn't find where he threw off his daypack. Snow fell harder and began to accumulate on the ground, and Jacob was losing daylight.

Just after 3 p.m., Josh Gately exited the boulder field to a clearing of trees, just as Jacob had instructed. His younger brother was nowhere in sight.

"Jacob!" Josh yelled.

Silence.

"Jacob!"

More silence.

Three inches of snow had already fallen. Josh ran 200 yards across the clearing, trying to catch a glimpse of Jacob, but he saw no one.

Josh wondered if his brother had gone ahead to a stream to purify drinking water, so he headed for East East Cross Creek, a major drainage that starts at about 13,800 feet and runs 11 miles down to the Eagle River.

He trolled the banks of the creek, calling out Jacob's name. He stopped at three campsites and talked to the hikers whom he and Jacob had passed while climbing.

No one had seen Jacob.

Exhausted and thirsty, Josh headed back to the campsite on Half Moon Pass. It was 6:30 p.m., and falling snow had buried the camp. Josh passed the camp several times. Finally, he stumbled upon the fire pit that he and Jacob had set up the night before.

Jacob wasn't at the camp.

Josh crawled in his tent, put on dry clothes and snuggled into his sleeping bag. Jacob had their only water purifier, so Josh filled a bowl with snow and placed it on his chest, using his body heat to melt it.

Josh decided that if Jacob didn't show up by 7, he would call 911.

Waiting in his tent, Josh's mind wandered. His brother hadn't planned on hiking in the dark. He hadn't packed enough food or water. The worst-case scenarios played in his mind. Was Jacob unconscious in the boulder field? Had Jacob fallen off a cliff? Had a mountain lion attacked him?

Seven o'clock came without Jacob. Josh dialed 911. The emergency dispatcher connected Josh to Bruce Norring of the Vail Mountain Rescue Group. Norring, the on-duty rescue coordinator, was a 16-year veteran of the rescue team. Norring listened to Josh's story and told him that there was nothing rescuers could do. Nightfall mixed with the heavy snow made a rescue mission too dangerous.

But Norring had an idea where Jacob probably got lost. Josh's call was similar to the 12 to 18 calls a year that the rescue team gets from lost hikers. Mount of the Holy Cross' contours push hikers off the mountain's ridgeline and typically into about a square mile of wetlands. Norring figured that Jacob had stumbled into a willow patch. With stalks that rise 7 feet tall, the willows can trap a hiker like a corn maze.

Norring told Josh to stay put and conserve his cell-phone battery, which was almost dead. Josh needed to keep a line of communication open with the Eagle County Sheriff's Office and the volunteers from the Vail Mountain Rescue Group.

Josh clutched his cell phone to his chest and waited.

Farther up the mountain, Jacob had given up hope of finding his brother in the jagged boulders. Snow continued to pile up. The temperature was dropping, and darkness was falling. At about 7 p.m., Jacob found a trail marker along a stream.

Jacob climbed onto a jutting rock over the stream. The rock had iced over. Jacob lost his footing and fell 10 feet into the frigid East Cross Creek. He grabbed a branch of a fallen tree and pulled himself out of the water. He was soaked up to his chest.

Disoriented and fatigued, Jacob cursed himself. He knew there was no chance of making it back to camp that night. He had to build a fire or he would freeze.

Jacob's survival instincts took over. He ignored his hunger pangs. He set up camp among a dense thicket of pine trees. The cover from the trees kept the snow off him but also made the night pitch-black. He scavenged wood and built a 7-foot fire pit. He strung his blue jeans, thermal underwear and socks on makeshift teepees. His raincoat, fleece jacket and thermal shirt had stayed relatively dry. Jacob pulled an old Bic lighter out of his pocket. The lighter was low on fluid. Jacob emptied the credit and business cards out of his wallet. He used them as kindling to start a fire.