Anchorage Daily News

PALMER -- The family of a California couple whose plane took off from Wolf Lake airport northwest of Palmer in June and disappeared is gearing up for an intensive search for the couple next week.

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Gary Patigler

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Leslie Taylor-McLaughlin, sister-in-law to Gerhard and Ingrid Patigler, said the family is paying for its own search in an area they believe may have been overlooked when Alaska and Canadian searchers flew over the area in late June and early July.

The cost is steep: likely upwards of $100,000. But for the family, there is no other option.

"The worst thing I keep worrying about with every day that goes by is, if they were alive (and waiting for rescue), can you imagine if we're four days too late?" Taylor-McLaughlin said.

The Patiglers, 69 and 66, flew up with friends in two other small planes for a sightseeing trip in early June, Taylor-McLaughlin said. The couple lives in Richmond, Calif., where they have a metal-plating business. They flew from Bettendorf, Iowa, where they have a second home, a farm and a second business.

Taylor-McLaughlin said the couple stayed in Palmer before their flight, visiting pilot Jay Baldwin at the Wolf Lake airport. Baldwin is helping coordinate the search effort.

According to their flight plan, the couple planned to fly from Wolf Lake to Whitehorse, Yukon, via Glennallen and Tok. But Tok was weathered in, so the family believes plants changed. The last sighting of their red and white Beechcraft Bonanza was at Dan Creek Landing east of McCarthy.

That's where family members say the search may have taken a wrong turn. A pilot who was at Dan Creek Landing that day reported seeing the plane. It's distinctive because it has a v-shaped tail instead of the typical flat tail. When family members spoke with him later, they believe he incorrectly recalled which direction the plane flew -- he said it was flying southeast but later realized the plane was flying north, probably up the Skolai valley.

"We don't believe Alaska search and rescue searched that valley. It wasn't on their flight plan, and a witness only figured it out later," Taylor-McLaughlin said.

Taylor-McLaughlin said Patigler was a confident pilot, not known for taking risks. He had two Garmin GPS devices on board, camping gear and a .30-30 rifle. The family believes if the couple was able to land somewhere, they have skills and equipment to stay alive.

"I'm hoping they're fine and they're just eating moose steaks or something," she said.

Maggie Moonin, public information officer with the Alaska Department of Military and Veterans Affairs, said the Alaska Air National Guard searched Skolai Valley several times between June 21 and July 18.

Moonin said searchers used an HC-130 Hercules and an HH-60 Pavehawk. Pilots from the National Park Service and Alaska Civil Air Patrol assisted. But searching was called off because searchers couldn't locate an emergency beacon and went over "every possible site in the area they believe the aircraft would have been," Moonin said.

The Patigler family has asked for search grids and witness contacts to use when they conduct their search next week. So far, Taylor-McLaughlin said, they have not received as much information as they hoped. Moonin said the information should be forthcoming.

"We're always willing to help families find their loved ones," she said.

Troopers Lt. Barry Wilson, who coordinates ground searches for Alaska Search and Rescue, said the area between Palmer and the Canadian border is "massive," and searching for planes in Alaska, with trees in leaf, can be difficult. But if it were his family missing, he would be searching too.

"I certainly understand them wanting to continue on," he said.

Find Daily News reporter Rindi White online at adn.com/contact/rwhite or call her at 352-6709.

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