Utah Father, Two Sons Stranded for Days After Wrong Turn
Published at
File photo. iStock/Thinkstock(PAYSON, Utah) — The Utah man who was rescued Saturday after being stranded with his two young sons in a canyon for days says “anything could have happened” during their terrifying ordeal.
Jason Knight of Payson, Utah, took his 8- and 11-year-old sons camping Tuesday in Utah’s Sandthrax Canyon. The trio got lost when Knight says he took a wrong turn that led them to a far more dangerous canyon.
“It was supposed to be a three-hour tour,” Knight said. “I made a wrong turn.”
“Everything out there looks the same,” he said.
Knight said he positioned his sons on a safe ledge while he went on to find an escape. That only made the family’s ordeal worse, however, when Knight became trapped in the narrow walls of the canyon, about 350 feet away from his children.
“They could not hear me. I could not hear them,” Knight said.
A break finally came on Friday when Knight’s wife called authorities after her husband and sons failed to return home. County authorities launched a search and, on Saturday, a helicopter located the boys.
“I put them in a place where a helicopter could easily find them,” Knight said. “I knew if something bad happened to me, if they found them, they could probably find me.”
Knight says his sons had only one granola bar and some water on hand while they were lost. All three family members survived the ordeal with only bumps and bruises and some dehydration.
“We were in a very bad situation and without preparedness and the rescue people,” Knight said, “we wouldn’t have made it out.”
Copyright 2014 ABC News Radio