Dry Pages, Frosted Rock: The Surveyor Lost Above Fenner Pass

Dry Pages, Frosted Rock: The Surveyor Lost Above Fenner Pass

A flat granite rock in Broken Tooth Meadow held an orange spiral-bound journal with pages open to the sky and completely dry, despite frosted surrounding rock and an overnight temperature below freezing. Why were Earl Riley’s meticulous, labeled supplies and a bone-dry journal at odds with fifteen centimeters of new snow and a near-whiteout above Fenner Pass?

In this episode, you’ll hear how a filed four-night route, a missing truck, and three SAR teams converged on a contradiction that stretched their assumptions; can the pieces of Earl Riley’s careful plan be reconciled to explain where he was and how he survived? Press play to follow the three separate clues that pulled the search in different directions.

Person: Earl Riley
Date: April 13-19, 2019
Location: Fenner Pass / Broken Tooth Meadow, Sennett National Forest, eastern Oregon
Status: Missing then found alive after 36 hours of search adjustments
Organization: Cascade Search and Rescue

- Earl Riley was 52 years old and had filed a four-night route with the forest service and left a copy with neighbor Warren Goble.
- He signed the Copperbell Creek trailhead register at 6:55 AM on April 13, the last confirmed contact.
- A cold front dropped temperatures to -6°C and deposited 15 cm of new snow above 7,500 feet between April 14 evening and April 15 morning.
- Pamela Slater, 44, led Cascade SAR and had three teams into Sennett National Forest by the morning of April 18.
- Two search dogs circled persistently in a roughly 40-meter area near a rocky depression below the Fenner Pass ridgeline for 18 minutes.

To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

© 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.