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Searchers in wilderness seek missing forest worker Todd Morris hasn't been seen since Saturday, when he left camp during a storm By PAUL FATTIG Mail Tribune SELMA - A two-man search team equipped with snowshoes was expected to be dropped off by helicopter late Tuesday in the remote Kalmiopsis Wilderness to look for a Forest Service contract worker missing since Saturday. Todd Morris, 35, of Centralia, Wash., was surveying vegetation in the Siskiyou National Forest on South Bend Mountain about 18 miles northwest of Selma. There has been no sign of Morris since he left the camp he shared with his father-in-law and contract partner, Mike Kazio, to hike some two miles to retrieve equipment on Saturday during a snowstorm, officials said. A National Guard scout helicopter, whose Tuesday search for Morris with infrared radar came up with no clues, would drop off a paramedic and a member of the sheriff's department search and rescue unit at the camp, said Al Rhodes, emergency services coordinator for the Josephine County Sheriff's Office. "The two-man technical team will go out on snowshoes to try to walk the path that Morris took," Rhodes said. "We're been doing everything we can from the air. But he may have injured himself." Kazio told authorities that his son-in-law is equipped with warm clothing, a flashlight, a lighter and food. Morris is also an experienced hiker and camper, according to Kazio. "Morris was prepared to go out for a day - he took extra clothes and some food," Rhodes said. Morris had been contracted last July by the Forest Service to do a forest inventory in the remote, rugged wilderness, said Mary Marrs, spokeswoman for the Siskiyou and Rogue River forests. The work included measuring vegetation on 21/2-acre plots that are 3.4 miles apart in the wilderness, she said. The information gained from the more than 500 such plots throughout the forest will be used to evaluate the forest flora, from native grasses to trees, she said. Although she did not know Morris, she said the nature of the work - measuring plants, determining their age, health and species - required that he know his way around wilderness areas. Kazio searched for Morris on Sunday, then hiked for two days to notify authorities that his son-in-law was missing, officials said. A Forest Service helicopter based in Merlin searched for Morris on Monday afternoon to no avail, Marrs said. South Bend Mountain, which rises to 3,413 feet above sea level, is just southwest of Bald Mountain on the northern edge of the wilderness area. There are no roads into the region which has been hit hard by a series of snowstorms over the weekend. If the air and the two-man search team can't find Morris, a search team on horses may be deployed, Rhodes said. "The weather was nice and clear yesterday and today," Rhodes said Tuesday afternoon. "But we're supposed to have some more weather rolling in on Thursday. We want to find him by then." Reach reporter Paul Fattig at 776-4496 or e-mail him at [email protected] Mail Tribune Home | Ottaway Newspapers, Inc. | Dow Jones & Co., Inc. | Privacy | Contact Us Copyright � 2001 Mail Tribune, Inc.