Troop 26 Boy Scouts and adult leaders take a group photo during their weeklong backcountry trek in the Emigrant Wilderness. Michael-James Hey photo
Deep in California’s Emigrant Wilderness, in the High Sierra north of Yosemite, Santa Barbara’s Boy Scout Troop 26 was on a backcountry trek when they came across a man standing alone in a meadow at the edge of the trail. He was dressed lightly for the terrain, carried no gear and appeared disoriented.
“He was very polite, very cordial, but he was a little confused in what he was saying,” Scoutmaster Michael-James Hey said. “It just didn’t look quite right. He had a lot of cuts on his hands, and he didn’t have his pack.”
The man, 78-year-old Douglas Montgomery, was cold, dehydrated and more than a dozen miles from where he thought he was.
The Scouts, many of them just 12 years old, were four days into a weeklong backcountry trek that Hey said was the culmination of months of training. Troop 26’s annual summer hike in August took them deep into the High Sierra to build endurance, teamwork and outdoor skills.
“We were at our most extreme point, so we were furthest from any trailheads,” he said.
Montgomery didn’t immediately ask for help, but Hey quickly realized something wasn’t right.
“It took some questioning and back-and-forth to really uncover how serious it was,” Hey said, adding that he was especially concerned that Montgomery was missing the backpack that held his water, food and emergency beacon.
Montgomery had set it down at some point and could not find it again, he told the Santa Barbara Independent when recounting his trip and the rescue.
“I checked and checked and checked, and looked and looked,” Montgomery said. “It was very, very disconcerting not to be able to find it, but I had to make a decision at the last minute just to stop looking and get where I could save my own life, and that’s what I did.”
Hey, who had completed search-and-rescue training, made the call to activate his Garmin inReach, a satellite communication device capable of summoning help in remote areas without cell service.
“I know the process, what questions they’re going to ask, what triage choices they’re going to make,” he said. “So I was very prepared with all of those responses.”
Through the Garmin, Hey relayed Montgomery’s condition to emergency responders.
“Wherever we are, we can text messages back and forth,” Hey said, “and then if you’re in an emergency, you can trigger the SOS service and they will coordinate a rescue.”
He and Assistant Scoutmaster Orin Rowe stayed behind with Montgomery while the rest of the troop continued on to their next campsite with three other adult leaders.
Troop 26 Scoutmaster M.J. Hey and Assistant Scoutmaster Orin Rowe aided Montgomery into the CHP Helicopter for evacuation. | Credit: Courtesy
Before departing, the Scouts donated food and electrolytes from their supplies, which Hey kept in case the rescue required them to stay another night.
“The Scouts were really wonderful. They gave up the spare food they had,” Hey said. “They were only too happy to help.”
While awaiting the helicopter, Hey said the focus was on Montgomery’s immediate care. They helped him settle in the sun to regain warmth and monitored his condition closely.
“When I realized his age and tried to move him, he was very unsteady on his feet,” Hey said. “It took two of us supporting him to get him to the rock and get him heated up.”
The Tuolumne County Sheriff’s Office coordinated with the California Highway Patrol to dispatch a rescue helicopter, which Hey and Rowe helped Montgomery board, supporting him as he remained unsteady on his feet. Meanwhile, the rest of the troop continued their hike to Toejam Lake.
Hey and Rowe rejoined the troop later that day. That evening, around the campfire, Hey shared his approach with the Scouts.
“I went through here’s my thought process, here are the decisions, here’s why I made these choices, here’s how I checked them out medically,” he said.
Some of the Scouts had seen the helicopter from afar, and many were eager to understand what had happened.
“It was an incredible teaching moment for all the Scouts,” Hey said. “They wanted to hear about why and what, and they really took a lot of lessons away from it.”
The group discussed the importance of their training and what it meant to apply the Scout Law in a real-world emergency.
“Being helpful, being prepared, being trustworthy. They got to really see how their training can make a difference in someone’s life,” Hey said.
In an interview with the Los Angeles Times after the incident, Montgomery said he was “thrilled to see Troop 26,” both because they rescued him and because he believes “it is so important to teach young people how to live in the wilderness.”
Hey said the rescue reinforced the value of preparedness and helped the Scouts understand that even small actions, such as staying calm under pressure, can have a real impact.
“A lot of the Scouts really got the message that this can happen to anybody,” Hey said. “You really need to take the buddy system and the training seriously. These are things to live by.”
Troop 26 meets at 7 p.m. every Tuesday at St. Mark Preschool, 3942 La Colina Road in Santa Barbara. Hey said interested families are always welcome to attend to try out the troop for an evening.
