The California Army National Guard rescued a hiker Monday morning who had been missing all weekend in the Sierra Nevada mountain range.

The 33-year-old man was reported missing after failing to meet up with another hiker Friday near Lake Alpine, California.

The backcountry hiking offered in the Sierra Nevada mountains is coveted by outdoor enthusiasts, but the region is also rugged, remote and at times subject to temperamental weather.

The Army Guard was activated Sunday night by the Governor’s Office of Emergency Services to assist Alpine County Sheriff’s Department in the search, according to an Army press release.

A UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter and its four-person crew from the California Guard’s Army Aviation Support Facility #3 out of Mather Airport were dispatched at 8:30 a.m. Monday.

A pair of search-and-rescue personnel were also sent in to look for the missing hiker on the ground.

Within an hour, the crew had located the hiker down a ravine in a rugged and mountainous area of Stanislaus National Forest in the Sierra Nevada mountain range.

The crew of a UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter from the California Army National Guard's Army Aviation Support Facility #3 in Mather, California, is photographed in Bear Valley after rescuing a lost hiker, left, in rugged, mountainous terrain near Lake Alpine, Monday morning, July 22, 2019. The hiker was reported missing after failing to meet up with another hiker July 19 near Lake Alpine. The Cal Guard was activated Sunday night by the California Governor's Office of Emergency Services to assist Alpine County Sheriff's Department on the search. (Courtesy photo)

The crew was flying over the treetops, maintaining low altitude and cruising speed, when the hiker was spotted waving at the helicopter.

“We found him on a river bed and he was waving at us with some sticks and making it apparent that he needed to be hoisted and saved,” Army Capt. Christopher Sandin, one of the pilots on the flight, said in the release.

The crew set up a hoist and lowered the flight paramedic 140 feet to the hiker. Once on the ground, the paramedic scanned the hiker for a quick medical evaluation and helped him into the rescue seat to be towed up into the Black Hawk.

“Once we located him, we went right into hoist mode and set up for that and right into business. We wanted to do it quickly and safely so we could get this guy out of there,” Sandin said.

The hiker was brought to a command post set up in nearby Bear Valley for medical treatment.

The search-and-rescue mission was the California Guard’s fifth this year in support of local, state and federal government efforts. It was the Guard’s second save in California in 2019.

Kyle Rempfer was an editor and reporter who has covered combat operations, criminal cases, foreign military assistance and training accidents. Before entering journalism, Kyle served in U.S. Air Force Special Tactics and deployed in 2014 to Paktika Province, Afghanistan, and Baghdad, Iraq.

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