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April Pitzer Search
Barstow, CA
March 16th-19th
Mojave Mine Team
Barstow, CA
March 16th-19th
Mojave Mine Team
Mojave Underground Inc. and the Underground Explorers have just returned from a week-long trip to the Barstow, CA area. Our mission was to search for missing person, April Pitzer. For those who aren’t familiar with the case, April Pitzer was a thirty year old woman who went missing while traveling in 2004. Her last known location was the Barstow area in South Eastern California. When April failed to return home and could not be reached, the search for her began. Local Search and Recovery teams, detectives, and hundreds of volunteers scoured the surrounding desert for years, but were not able to locate her. Several leads in the case point to the mines surrounding Barstow and Ludlow, CA.
Six years later, the search for April Pitzer continues in the mine shafts. The experience and equipment of Mojave Underground and Underground Explorers enabled us to search further and deeper in the more extensive mines. Working with April’s mother, Gloria Denton, landowners, local S&R, and the detective, six of the MMT took time off work to assist in the search.
The first location of search was the historic railway hub and mining town of Barstow, CA. Sunny skies and warm temperatures met the team as they coordinated tuning up equipment, meeting with other search volunteers, and scheduling the search. The target area for day one was Lead Mountain, just east of Barstow. Lead Mountain has over a dozen adits, shafts, inclines, and a residence of owls who didn’t seem to appreciate our presence. The mines in the area are subject to heavy erosion, resulting in the shafts becoming plugged over time. The most interesting mine we explored on Lead Mountain was fairly extensive and contained a deep winze that we investigated by camera.
Elephant Mountain and the Waterman Mine Complex were the focus of our efforts on day two. Elephant Mountain is south east of Barstow and consists of three shafts and a collapsed stope. Teams dug through several feet of rubble at the bottom of the shafts and were able to check them off our list. The highlight of the day was when Robert decided to bog his truck through a heavily rutted and muddy section of road, adding some manhood to his vehicle
The Waterman Mine Complex is located directly north of Barstow approximately 5 miles. The area was riddled with trash, glass, nails, and vandalism. It was obvious that the area is used heavily by the locals as a garbage dump and party spot. The mine follows a long ore vein surfacing at a nearly vertical dip with a consistent strike parallel to the ridge of the mountain. Along this vein are many deep stopes and access shafts filled with garbage. Jeremiah repelled the deepest stope at 300’ and was met half way by Robert and a few others who ventured into a lower partially buried adit. In this adit they were surprised to find a full set of women’s clothing. Mike brought them out of the mine and presented them to Gloria for identification. She believed that the clothing belonged to April due to several unique characteristics. The clothing were given to the detective to undergo further investigation.
Day Three of the search took us south of Ludlow, CA to the Bagdad Chase mines. Crystal and Mike Schriber ventured on rope down the steep main incline while Stuart explored another nearby shaft. Jeremiah, Derek, Mike, and Robert moved the trucks and winch to the top of the secondary Bagdad Chase shaft and began the winch construction to span and drop the 200’ shaft. Upon completion of setup many of us dropped down the shaft on the winch and explored the depths of the mine. From our investigation we were able to determine that we were the only visitors in the mine since a survey team in the 1970's.
Day four was also spent on the Bagdad Chase property, searching the Old Pete’s mine complex, an old air shaft near old Pete's, and visiting the Red Dog Mine. Little was known about the air shaft, including the knowledge of whether it was an airshaft at all. The shaft turned out to be a hot, humid, and unstable mine with a 50' shaft with a steep incline below that. Old Pete's is comprised of a hill with a large collapsed stope and several small shafts. Nothing substantial was found at Old Pete's with the exception of a live rattlesnake and several dead rats. The Red Dog Mine has been searched extensively in the past, but it’s historical allure and interesting cribbing methods warranted a visit to the mine before retiring for the day. In a rat's nest several bones were found, but they were all identified as animal bones.
The search for April Pitzer was a learning experience for all of us and provided an excellent opportunity to use our unique skills to help provide comfort for April's family. The mines of the desert can hold many secrets; Gloria Denton and April's children can now rest assured that many of those mines have nothing to hide. With little hard evidence and viable leads to work with, it is impossible to determine whether she may even be in a mine at all. We are thankful to have had the experience and we look forward to having opportunities to help like this in the future.
Images from the trip can be viewed here:
Be one of the first to watch the April Pitzer documentary here on Mojave Underground!
The Search for April Pitzer
View in:
480p (88MB, 1MB/sec) Low Quality SD (Quick Download)
720p (250MB, 8MB/sec) **RECOMMENDED**
1080p (1GB, 12MB/sec) High Quality Full HD
1080p (2GB, 25MB/sec)[/url] Max Quality Full HD **TEMPORARILY OFFLINE**
View in:
480p (88MB, 1MB/sec) Low Quality SD (Quick Download)
720p (250MB, 8MB/sec) **RECOMMENDED**
1080p (1GB, 12MB/sec) High Quality Full HD
1080p (2GB, 25MB/sec)[/url] Max Quality Full HD **TEMPORARILY OFFLINE**
Or view the YouTube version here:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dVnBrg8nDFo[/youtube]
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dVnBrg8nDFo[/youtube]
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