Santa Cruz County man rescued from remote canyon after nine-day search

BOULDER CREEK — A search and rescue effort more than nine days in the making concluded near the end of the longest day of the year when emergency responders found Lukas McClish, alive, near the bottom of a remote canyon.

Family members reported McClish, 34, of Boulder Creek, missing on June 11, saying the unexplained absence was out of character. It was not until a little after 3 p.m. Thursday that multiple people reported hearing someone yelling for help between Big Basin Highway and Empire Grade, according to Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Office spokesperson Ashley Keehn.

Boulder Creek Fire Protection District Chief Mark Bingham described the area where McClish, son of retired Boulder Creek Fire Chief Kevin McClish, as undeveloped San Lorenzo Valley Water District property characterized by boulders, shale and steep terrain. Even with a general idea of where McClish may have been, the canyon area was obscured by thick tree canopy blocking the line of sight for helicopters.

Then, the Sheriff’s Office and Boulder Creek Fire drone operators began winding through the woods until their speakers could pick up the sound of McClish’s voice yelling, allowing responders to put a GPS marking or ‘pin drop’ on him before choosing a closer location to launch rescue efforts, Bingham said.

The area McClish was found, near Foreman Creek, is located in the canyon below Braemoor, a community off of Empire Road, Bingham said.

“There are no trails, no roads, several miles from the closest place to a road, which the closest road that we got into, we had to four-wheel drive probably a quarter of a mile in and then we couldn’t go further,” Bingham said.

State Parks Public Safety Superintendent Capt. Gabe McKenna said his agency had two rangers, one with a K9 partner, involved in Thursday’s final search.

“The calls for help were coming down a steep hillside, so it’s my understanding that our two officers repositioned down (Highway) 236 and tried to make an approach up,” McKenna said. “Our K9 officer and his partner Rhino were able to get a track right off of the creek bed into the vicinity of the area where the missing person had been earlier to get water.

From that track, Rhino basically pulled the officer right up to the location where he was located.”

Once located, McClish required some assistance to hike out to the command base on his own, but “he was going to try to help himself out of there as soon as we — we were there to say, ‘Hey, come this way,’” Bingham said.

“About 10 days he survived in the wilderness, essentially, drinking out of the creek and eating wild berries,” Bingham said. “He did have a minor injury … but, for the most part, he was disoriented and lost and surviving off of the land, which is pretty impressive to say what a tough individual he was or is.”