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Rescue teams continue the search for missing Boise Foothills hiker after snowpack melts

Now that much of the snow in the Boise Foothills has melted, search and rescue teams are resuming the search for Kyle Crowden, who went for a hike on the Dry Creek Trail on Feb. 9 and has not been seen or heard from since then.

BOISE, Idaho — The search has resumed in the Boise foothills for a hiker who went missing more than a month ago.

Kyle Crowden, 27, of Mountain Home has been missing since Saturday, Feb. 9 after going for a hike on the Dry Creek Trail off of Bogus Basin Road. He set out alone and no one has seen or heard from him since.

Searchers found his Toyota Camry parked at the trailhead about 4.5 miles up Bogus Basin Road. The car was covered in a thick layer of snow when it was found.

RELATED: Crews call off search for missing hiker in Boise foothills

Idaho Mountain Search and Rescue teams and the Ada County Sheriff's Office set up a command post near the trailhead and searched for Crowden for several days, but eventually called off the search due to heavy snow in the hills.

A search coordinator told KTVB that 28 are people involved in the latest search effort which got underway Monday morning. That includes four search dogs and their handlers.

He says the dogs will be used to search in areas that people were unable to access in the previous search.

RELATED: Search crews hunt for Boise hiker missing near Dry Creek

"We're out here trying to use the advantage of the wind and air currents in order to get scent to the dog so, the dog can pick up any clues or anything that might be out there," Aaron Burdin, a spokesperson for Idaho Mountain Search and Rescue, said. "It's a great tool, in terms of, it reduces how many people necessary to clear an area because a dog can move around a lot more and pick up scent from further away."  

Some of the higher elevations are still blanketed in four to six feet of snow.

RELATED: Missing foothills hiker's mother speaks out for the first time about continuing the search

Grounds crews are also headed out to some lower elevations to search for the missing hiker. They plan to be out all day.

"Unlike before, today, we're doing a pretty big grid search because of the snowmelt and how clear everything is we can actually get up onto all of the drainage and do some more intensive and much more focused searching than what we did before," Burdin said.  

The coordinator said this is a good-sized area to cover, and access is pretty difficult in some spots.

"All of the areas that are covered [by the crews] are captured on a GPS" Ada County Sheriff Sgt. Mike Rowe said. "The GPS is downloaded on a rescue mapping software so we can see exactly where they went and what they covered."

At this time they do not need any additional volunteers to help in the search.

If today’s search is unsuccessful, they will evaluate the situation tonight before deciding if they will send crews back out Tuesday.

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