Washington Mudslide: Desperate Search for Missing Baby, Other Victims

By: By Laura Dattaro

Published: March 25,2014

 

 

 

 

 

An Oso firefighter's wife and granddaughter are among the missing after a landslide that killed at least fourteen and left over 100 unaccounted for on Saturday.
Firefighter Seth Jefferds and his step-daughter were in town when the landslide hit near the home where Jefferds' wife Christina was babysitting their 4-month-old granddaughter, Sanoah Huestis, KING 5 News reports. Other firefighters told the news station that Jefferds is not working or participating in the search efforts at this time.

Christina Jefferds with Sanoah. (Credit: Personal Photo/KiroTV.com)

Because the slide occurred on a Saturday, more people were in their homes and in the path of danger than there would have been during the week, officials say. Among the missing is Oso resident Reed Miller’s 47-year-old son Joseph, who remained at their home on Steelhead Drive while Miller went to a grocery store.
“Well, every Saturday I go shopping. Normal,” Miller told KATU. “And if I’d waited, I might have been killed myself.”
A group of girls that were having a slumber party are also unaccounted for.
For some, the difficult search — which has been impeded by quicksand-like mud — has proved frustrating as family members and neighbors waited for official word on the missing and the dead. Elaine Young and her neighbors uncovered several bodies Sunday and had to contact authorities to get them removed.
Crews eventually threatened to arrest the family of 36-year-old Summer Raffo, The Times reports, after they spent hours wading into deep mud to find her. Raffo was driving along Highway 530 when the slide hit and hasn’t been heard from since.
“You just want to keep on moving every log yourself until you find her,” Dayn Brunner, Raffo’s brother, told The Times.
Local resident Barbara Welsh is still searching for her husband, Bill Welsh, who was installing a hot-water heater on Steelhead Drive on Saturday and has not been seen or heard from since, KIRO reports. The TV station has collected photos of some of the missing.
One survivor, Kevin Tollenaar, whose relative Bonnie Gullikson is missing, told KIRO that the slide “felt like an earthquake. Next thing you know the house moved. You’re going from about zero to 20 miles an hour in about half a second.”
Snohomish County continued to plead with residents not to visit the slide area to try to help, due to safety concerns, and asked them to report details of the missing.
For more on how to help in the relief effort, click here.
MORE: Photos From the Massive Landslide



 

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Riley Bradley, 7, is pictured with donations she brought to a temporary Red Cross shelter at the Darrington Community Center on March 24, 2014, in Darrington, Wash. (David Ryder/Getty Images)

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Washington Governor Jay Inslee (C) speaks with Greg Regelbrugge at a temporary Red Cross shelter at the Darrington Community Center on March 24, 2014, in Darrington, Wash. (David Ryder/Getty Images)

 

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Eveleen Promise holds her son, Xaven, 7, as they wait for word of missing family members at the fire station in Oso, Wash., following a deadly mudslide two days earlier Monday, March 24, 2014. (AP Photo/Elaine Thompson)

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Community members, including Arlington City Council member Jan Schuette, right, listen during a news conference about a deadly mudslide that happened two days earlier, Monday, March 24, 2014, in Arlington, Wash. (AP Photo/Elaine Thompson)

 

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Kristopher Langton shares a moment with his son, Kristian Langton (5 months), at a temporary Red Cross shelter at the Darrington Community Center in Darrington, Wash., on March 23, 2014. (David Ryder/Getty Images)

Trista Bonus (L, 11), watches an online news clip about a nearby mudslide with (2L - R) LoAnna Langton, Kristian Langton (5 months), and Elijah Kristopher Langton (11), at a temporary Red Cross shelter at the Darrington Community Center in Darrington, Wash., on March 23, 2014. (David Ryder/Getty Images)