Search has similarities to 2008 hiking incident

In the ongoing search for missing hiker Jakson Kreiser, there are eerie similarities to a search for another man four years ago.

Kreiser, a 19-year-old from Michigan who was working his first summer in the park at Lake McDonald Lodge, is believed to have left Logan Pass Saturday on the Hidden Lake Trail with plans for a day hike to Avalanche Lake.

He was reported missing the next day and a search was launched.

On Tuesday, searchers identified a partial track that matched the sole pattern of boots believed to be worn by Kaiser at a location near Mary Baker Lake in the Floral Park area, which would have put him just to the southeast of towering cliffs between that location and the head of Avalanche Lake.

In August 2008, Yi-Jien Hwa set off from Logan Pass on a similar route.

Like Kreiser, he was hiking alone and was new to the park. After an exhaustive search that lasted for weeks, no sign was found of the Malaysian native who lived in Kentucky.

Last summer, bone fragments and two items of clothing were discovered below the cliffs above Avalanche Lake.

A genetic analysis conducted this year confirmed that the bone fragments were the remains of Hwa.

“It’s a similar route and a similar area, absolutely,” said Ranger Kyle Johnson, who is supervising ground and aviation operations in the search for Kreiser. “None of us will ever know what [Hwa] was thinking” in picking the route he did.

But the steep terrain around Avalanche Lake was a concern for search leaders at the time, and it was one of the focuses of a meticulous search even though the Avalanche Basin was off of Hwa’s intended route.

Dennis Divoky, one of the leaders involved with the Hwa search, said the cliffs above the lake would have exposed Hwa to serious hazards.

“It’s frightening to think of someone who would try downclimbing” the cliffs, Divoky said at the time.

Downclimbing can start out easy but it can eventually lead the climber into places where he has to take bigger risks to keep moving down.

Johnson said the search for Kreiser is partially focused on the same area.