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SALT LAKE CITY (AP) -- More than 200 volunteers and search and rescue team members searched into the night Sunday for a 12-year-old Boy Scout missing in the Uinta Mountains since Friday morning.
Garrett Bardsley of Elk Ridge was last seen was last seen about 8 a.m. Friday on the south side of Cuberant Lake, elevation 9,125 feet and 53 miles east of Salt Lake City.
He had been fishing with his father, Kevin Bardsley, when he got his shoes wet and his father sent him to camp, just a few hundred yards away, to change them, family friend Steven Wilson told The Salt Lake Tribune late Saturday.
Summit County officials received an emergency call around 11 a.m. Friday and the searching began.
The boy was wearing sweat pants, a T-shirt and a black hooded sweat shirt and tennis shoes, and had no provisions or backpack, said Sheriff Dave Edmunds said.
The temperature has dropped in the low 30s each night and there has been periodic rain and hail.
The possibility of hypothermia was a major issue, Edmunds told The Salt Lake Tribune.
"We remain cautiously optimistic, but as time goes on, it becomes less and less likely," he told KSL TV Sunday.
The boy's father took part in the search, joined Sunday by members of the family's church congregation. The boy's mother, who had been on a cruise, arrived Sunday.
Some of the searchers were on horseback and helicopters and a plane aided the search. Rocky Mountain Rescue and American Search dog teams also took part.
Edmunds said lost children usually are found within two miles of where they disappeared. Searchers combed that area and have begun expanding the search area.
The sheriff said that in the early stages of the search, it was assumed the boy would be able to hear people calling. They are no longer assuming that and are checking under logs and rocks, anywhere he might have taken shelter.
An adult with the Scout troop, who would not give his name, said 18 Scouts and six or seven adults had camped near Cuberant Lake on Thursday and had planned to leave Saturday.
This is the second time in a month a Boy Scout has become lost in the Uintas. A 13-year-old West Valley City boy got separated from his troop during a backpacking trip in late July and spent two days hiking alone before rescuers found him.
That scout was equipped with a map, compass and camping gear. Edmunds said Bardsley is not believed to have provisions for the area, where overnight temperatures dropped into the 30s.
(Copyright 2004 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
