A father and son who got lost in the desert of Utah barely escaped death thanks to finding a fully filled backpack that left another walker more than a month earlier.
Julian Hernandez and his son were completely disoriented while walking recently in the Red Mountain Trail area of the Dammeron Valley in the southwest of Utah.
Without a telephone signal or supplies, the duo thought they would perish in the desert – until they met a bag that was full of snacks and emergency articles in a miraculous way.
Thanks to 15-year-old Levi Dittman, who wrongly left the peloton, the lifeline came when he was trapped while trying to walk a treacherous part of the path 45 days earlier.
“Looking at the map, it seems flat, what it is not,” Dittman told ABC 4 as he described the path. “So someone else, don't try this.”
Dittman climbed a steep canyon on the route, where he got stuck. While he was stranded on a ledge at night, he threw his bag aside.
A search and rescue team eventually brought him to safety – but he accidentally left his expensive backpack.
“I just had to leave it there, which was a bit frustrating because I think it was $ 200 to 300 dollars at the time,” he told ABC 4.
Julian Hernandez and his son were completely disoriented while walking in the Red Mountain Trail area of Dammeron Valley in the southwest of Utah
Their lifeline came thanks to 15-year-old Levi Dittman (photo), who wrongly left a backpack when he was caught in the same place 45 days earlier
The bag was full of snacks and emergency items
Dittman thought the bag was gone forever, until he received a phone call from the Sheriff's Office from Washington County on Monday.
Officials told him that the bag was found by Hernandez and his son – and that it probably saved their lives.
“We finally got caught in the same place where, a month ago, that 15-year-old got stuck,” Hernandez told ABC 4.
“We didn't have the right things,” he remembered the day they get lost. “The first to come to me was to find shelter.”
Hernandez said they ventured to another place on the path, where they were waiting for help. It was there that they discovered Dittman's backpack.
“The moment we found the backpack – it was beautiful,” said Hernandez.
The bag was filled with pop cakes, Clif beams, connections and even an emergency tent.
'We found some food there, so that kept us pretty good. He also had a water jug, “said the father. “It kept us pretty good in the morning.”
Dittman thought the bag was gone until he received a phone call from the Sheriff's Office from Washington County this week. He was saved from the area 45 days earlier, as shown above
The bag was filled with pop cakes, Clif beams, connections and even an emergency tent
“Looking at the map, it seems flat, what it is not,” said Dittman, who described the path. 'So someone else, don't try this'
Ditmman said he was 'happy' that the bag could 'help' someone, while his mother Gretchen described the incident as a gift from God
“It was just such a moment of miracle,” she told ABC 4. “It was as if a miracle had happened.”
“You really have to have faith that God works,” she added.
'Sometimes he uses a backpack that was sitting for a month and a half for a man who needed help at that time – in the dark and cold.
“This is a god … fingerprint, you know? It was just very cool. '
