Four Year Old Spends Two Cold Days Alone in Montana’s Wilderness

By Gorloff-KV @ Shutterstock.com

You know there’s no more difficult situation to imagine than your child in danger somewhere you can’t help them. That’s where one family found itself late last week in Montana, as their son, 4-year-old Ryker, went missing for two days in the woods. The NY Post reports:

A missing 4-year-old boy was found safe after surviving two days on his own in the Montana wilderness in cold temperatures over the weekend.

Ryker Webb was found Sunday unharmed but “hungry, thirsty and cold” after a two-day search involving ground responders, ATV teams, canine teams, drones, helicopters and a boat unit from multiple agencies, the Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office announced.

The youngster was reported missing just before 5 p.m. Friday by a concerned neighbor. Deputies soon learned he’d already been missing for more than two hours at that point and had last been seen playing with the family dog in his yard south of Troy, Montana on the east side of Bull Lake.

He was alone in the wooded area as temperatures dropped into the 40s overnight Saturday and thunderstorms and heavy rainfall impacted the search effort.

Aerial search teams had to turn back due to “very poor weather conditions which consisted of rain, low visibility, and low ceiling,” according to the sheriff’s office.

Dense vegetation in the area also made the search for the little boy “extremely difficult,” the office added.

Ryker was finally found in Sanders County, about 2.4 miles from where he went missing, as a 53-person team was searching the area.

He “was in good spirits and apparently healthy, although hungry, thirsty, and cold,” the sheriff’s office said. He was brought to Cabinet Peaks Medical Center for evaluation.

Ryker was lucky. At four years old, he didn’t already have a “mental map” of what to do, or what he thought he should do, and therefore he simply followed his instincts. I wrote to you back in November 2021: “Guess who has the highest percentage rate for surviving when lost in the woods? Survivalists, mountaineers, ultra-marathoners? No. It’s children under the age of six. Why? Scientists believe it’s because they don’t yet have a mental map of where they are, or what one’s “supposed” to do. They seek shelter, burrowing in the trunk of a tree to stay warm, for example.”

Action Line: Sometimes people can outthink themselves. Don’t be one of them. Keep your solutions simple. If you need help staying on course, click here to subscribe to my free monthly Survive & Thrive letter. If you have children or grandchildren like Ryker who you want to put on the right path early in life, teach them to harness the power of compounding by saving early and often.

The following two tabs change content below.

• Bio
• Latest Posts

E.J. Smith - Your Survival Guy

E.J. Smith is Founder of YourSurvivalGuy.com, Managing Director at Richard C. Young & Co., Ltd., a Managing Editor of Richardcyoung.com, and Editor-in-Chief of Youngresearch.com. His focus at all times is on preparing clients and readers for “Times Like These.” E.J. graduated from Babson College in Wellesley, Massachusetts, with a B.S. in finance and investments. In 1995, E.J. began his investment career at Fidelity Investments in Boston before joining Richard C. Young & Co., Ltd. in 1998. E.J. has trained at Sig Sauer Academy in Epping, NH. His first drum set was a 5-piece Slingerland with Zildjians. He grew-up worshiping Neil Peart (RIP) of the band Rush, and loves the song Tom Sawyer—the name of his family’s boat, a Grady-White Canyon 306. He grew up in Mattapoisett, MA, an idyllic small town on the water near Cape Cod. He spends time in Newport, RI and Bartlett, NH—both as far away from Wall Street as one could mentally get. The Newport office is on a quiet, tree lined street not far from the harbor and the log cabin in Bartlett, NH, the “Live Free or Die” state, sits on the edge of the White Mountain National Forest. He enjoys spending time in Key West (RIP JB) and Paris. Please get in touch with E.J. at ejsmith@yoursurvivalguy.com To sign up for my free monthly Survive & Thrive letter, click here.

Latest posts by E.J. Smith - Your Survival Guy (see all)

• Do You Look Marvelous? See My Friend Marc - September 13, 2024
• Kitten Update This Week - September 13, 2024
• Dershowitz Decries “Hard Left” Hijacking of Democratic Party - September 13, 2024
• September RAGE Gauge: Win Friends and Influence People - September 12, 2024
• Stay Diversified My Friends - September 12, 2024