Missing hiker rescued from wilderness

Following her rescue Wednesday morning, a hiker from Arizona told authorities how she and her dog survived a week lost in the Great Bear Wilderness near Essex.

Flathead County Sheriff Chuck Curry said Madeline Connelly, 25, left her car at the Bear Creek Trailhead around midday last Thursday, May 4. Planning for a day hike, Connelly took no supplies, food or water with her.

According to Curry, Connelly said she got turned around a few hours into the hike and ended up hiking farther into the forest in search of a way out.

Curry said Connelly went six days without food, drinking from streams and sleeping under trees. Connelly told Curry she heard rescue helicopters fly over multiple times during the week but had no way of signaling for help through thick trees.

A Glacier National Park trail crew on Wednesday located Connelly in the Spruce Creek drainage off the east side of the Middle Fork of the Flathead River about 5 miles from her vehicle.

The Two Bear Air rescue helicopter was called in to lift her out from what Curry described as a heavily wooded area.

“She was very, very glad her adventure was over,” Curry said.

Curry said Connelly was in good condition. She was flown to West Glacier to meet her family.

Connelly was reported missing by her family after she failed to return from a day hike with her dog, while visiting relatives in the area. A full-scale search began two days later, after her car was found at the trail head about 4 miles south of Essex on U.S. 2.

Connelly told KTMF-TV that when she realized she was lost she figured she was on the loop of a trail and if she continued walking she would get back to where she had been.

“And then I ended up at a lake and I was like, well, this is not right,” she said.

Her rescuers estimated she hiked about 10 miles each day.

“All I had was overalls, a sweater with a hood, a T-shirt, my dog's leash, my dog and my car keys,” she said. “I feel like an idiot, honestly, because it was just a huge mistake that it ended up being seven days in kind of treacherous weather conditions.”

The sheriff's office, Flathead Search and Rescue, Glacier National Park, the Flathead National Forest, Two Bear Air Rescue and the Flathead Office of Emergency Services assisted in the search.

Curry says the dog was with Connelly and in good condition when she was found.

Connelly is originally from the Chicago area but had been living in Arizona. Family members said she stopped in Montana on her way to Alaska where she has a job managing a bakery.

Reporter Mary Cloud Taylor can be reached at 758-4459 or mtaylor@dailyinterlake.com. The Associated Press contributed to this story.