Utah authorities searching for New Castle hiker Rose Backhaus issued a plea today asking people who ventured into the backcountry at Utah’s Goblin Valley State Park between Nov. 16 and Monday to contact them.
Emery County, Utah, Sheriff Lamar Guymon said that according to the register at the park, the majority of those who hiked the rugged, canyon-filled park were from Colorado.
He said he would like people who were using the park then to contact the Emery County Sheriff’s Department at 435-381-2404.
Specifically, Guymon is asking people who may have seen Backhaus hiking the canyons or saw her maroon 2004 Explorer parked at the Little Wild Horse Canyon parking lot — where it was found Monday — to contact his department.
Backhaus is 5-foot-7, weighs 140 pounds and has brown curly hair and blue eyes.
As of 9 a.m., more than 40 people from four Utah law-enforcement agencies, plus volunteers, were scouring the canyons in the 3,654-acre park, Guymon said.
He said that although Backhaus didn’t sign her name in the register, a “party of one” from Colorado signed in on Nov. 16. The visitor said he or she planned a day hike in Little Wild Horse Canyon. Authorities believe the person was Backhaus.
Guymon said Little Wild Horse Canyon is where searchers today are concentrating their efforts, although Backhaus could have left the canyon and gone into myriad other canyons in the area.
A helicopter and several search dogs are joining ground searchers today, Guymon said. And specialists will rappel down canyon walls in case Backhaus fell and is trapped on a ledge or entangled in trees on the cliff side.
In some notes she left in her car, Backhaus said she had just arrived at Goblin Valley State Park on Nov. 16 after hiking and staying in the Moab area, about 70 miles east of the park.
Backhaus wrote that she was happy to be at Goblin Valley.
“She said it was warm, nice and something new,” said Guymon.
Friends and acquaintances of Backhaus said this was her first trip to the park known for its goblin-like rock formations, the sheriff said.
Backhaus left New Castle for Moab on Nov. 15 and was expected back in New Castle, west of Glenwood Springs, late the next day.
Backhaus was last seen checking out of the La Quinta Inn in Moab at about 8 a.m. Nov. 16. The last call from her cellphone hit a tower south of Moab at about 10:20 a.m. that day.
Guymon said that Backhaus’ cellphone was found in her car.
Howard Pankratz: 303-954-1939 or hpankratz@denverpost.com
