Search and rescue personnel are often the heroes of the stories we tell.

These professionals and volunteers save thousands of hikers from danger every year,

relying on extensive navigation, first aid, and search tactic training.

Without search and rescue, many lost and injured hikers would not be lucky enough to make it out alive.

But this story features a new kind of hero.

When Jeremy Humphrey set out to find a missing hiker in July 2020,

he didn't have any training or fancy rescue gear, but he had something else.

Lugs that could carry him for miles and miles in the day, an intimate knowledge of his local

mountain range, and a voice inside him telling him that he was the right man for the job.

I made a decision to survive in that survival mode. The idea of dying wasn't in my head.

I knew immediately it was a worst-case scenario. I was in a fight for my life situation.

Whenever you walk out on these trails, you're in their house.

I'm Louisa Almanes and you're listening to Out-Alive by Backpacker.

In each episode of this podcast, we'll bring you real stories of real people who survived the

unsurvivable. I saw the rope sift through the rappel ring and I couldn't do anything.

Learn what went wrong, what went right, and how you can escape if the worst-case scenario happens to you.

There is no way we would find anybody alive.

My name's Jeremy Humphrey. I live in McCall, Idaho. I'm 41 years old.

I've been a runner for 36 of my 41 years and I also direct ultra-marathons here in

in McCall. So on the day in question, it was a Friday. I had planned a long run.

I woke up at about seven o'clock in the morning and my wife was already up and she was on Facebook

on her phone and she said that the Valley County search and rescue in the Valley County Sheriff's

...