On Saturday afternoon, an Alaska State Trooper helicopter spotted Melanie Gould’s abandoned truck along the Denali Highway, far enough off the road it would not have been seen by a passing vehicle.
Alaska state Trooper spokesperson Beth Ipsen says the search is continuing today. Troopers on their days off are being called back today and they’ve asked for assistance from Alaska’s Civil Air Patrol. Ipsen says that the truck looked like it had just been parked along the old mining road trail where it was found. There was no damage to the vehicle and it looked like someone had just walked away from it. The truck was found about 18 miles east of Cantwell.
Troopers had been on the lookout for Gould, a Talkeetna resident and former Iditarod musher, since Tuesday when she was reported missing by friends and employers in Talkeetna. Troopers, as well as friends, did a welfare check at Melanies house. All her dogs were still there and her cellphone was left behind. Her truck was gone.
Sargent Troy Shuey met with a group of 30 or so residents on Friday and explained what the troopers had done in the search for Gould so far.
Local pilots, both fixed wing and helicopter, were in the air searching for Gould Friday and Saturday. Residents of Denali Park volunteered to search along Denali Highway. Friends in Fairbanks combed the Richardson Highway south to Paxson for clues.
Ipsen wasn’t able to confirm how many resources were at the search site today. Anyone with information on Gould’s whereabouts can contact the Talkeetna Trooper Post at 733-2256
An online public information clearinghouse of sorts was started through a facebook site for Melanie and by Sunday morning had over twelve hundred followers. This is one of the first tests in Alaska of the power of facebook and texting during a search for a missing person.
www.facebook.com/home.php#!/pages/Have-you-seen-Melanie-Gould/160060884060648
**a note from past stories – her sled dogs are being cared for by good friends as this story continues.
