YCSO Chopper Busy With Rescues This Month

The Yavapai County Sheriff’s Department’s rescue helicopter, “Rescue 1,” has been busy as of late. On Saturday, a mother reported her eight-year-old autistic son had run from the family while on the Thumb Butte Trail outside of Prescott at around 4:30 p.m. Family could not find the boy, so they called the sheriff’s office. Fortunately “Rescue 1” was already in the air and was able to arrive on the scene quickly. Within a few minutes of arriving, the crew located the missing boy and alerted deputies. Searchers arrived and recovered the boy. Then, earlier in the day a hunting party reported a 70-year-old man hadn’t arrived to a predesignated area and went missing from the group. The hunters were several miles west of Williamson Valley outside of Prescott in the Prescott National Forest. The man didn’t have a cell phone with him. “Rescue 1” was called in and about two hours later, crews found the man. The hunter told the crew he took a wrong turn and got lost. The crew gave the man a lift back to his group.