Missing 411: Unexplained Disappearances in America’s Wilderness
People are going missing in national parks and North American wilderness areas. A 2019 documentary, Missing 411: The Hunted, reports as many as 1,200 individuals have disappeared, but also admits that number may be under-reported.
David Paulides, a former police detective turned
private investigator, is the author of the popular Missing 411 series and documentaries of the same name, as well as the CanAm Missing Project. He said, “We don’t know how many people go missing from these locations because the USFS [United States Forest Service] and NPS [National Park Service] refuse to release a list of these missing people.”
Several Hundred Cases a Year
Paulides is dedicated to investigating missing persons in national parks and forests. When asked how many cases he typically researches in a year, he responded, “We probably research several hundred people per year.”
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One thing is certain: people who hike and camp in national parks or hunt in national forests and wilderness areas have vanished. These sobering stories are documented in Paulides’ latest documentary, Missing 411: The UFO Connection (2022).
Chantile Ferriera, TCA Content Manager at Wealth of Geeks, is a fan of the Missing 411 series. “I hold a healthy respect for the mountains and wilderness. I spent my childhood out with a telescope, watching the sky and looking for comets. Many times, as I tracked charts, I saw things that I couldn’t explain.
“After moving to Utah, I had many events where I knew I wasn’t alone in the woods. When you’re in the forest and mountains enough, you can feel the wildlife around you and can notice a difference when something has entered the area that belongs and one that doesn’t.”
Mysterious Disappearances in National Parks
Exploring the great outdoors is a rewarding activity, especially when visiting America’s prized national parks. But one thing that can derail plans while planning an outdoor adventure is safety.
Those visiting national parks and forests can get
lost, and, according to Paulides, there are reports of some tourists vanishing without a trace.
Public data available from Statista indicates that hundreds of thousands of people go missing every year in the U.S., with over 500,000 in 2021. How many of these missing persons have disappeared from national parks, forests, and wilderness areas?
Paulides’ books and documentaries assert a number of hikers and hunters have vanished from these areas, leaving nothing behind. His passion for the work was initially triggered by two park rangers who shared “strange circumstances” of hikers going missing, as discussed in Missing 411: The Hunted.
When asked if she was a skeptic or not, Ferriera shares, “I’ve seen lights, UFOs, had items vanish in front of us, and had things show up on camera that weren’t there when I was taking pictures. It’s easy to dismiss something when you aren’t there to experience it firsthand. In my opinion, nearly everyone has had an event or encounter, they are just too ashamed, scared, or skeptical to admit it.”
Cluster Zones
Paulides’ Missing 411 series and CanAm Missing Project present facts and eerie similarities investigators have found across missing person cases of people who have disappeared from federal lands in “cluster zones” around North America. California’s Yosemite National Park is high on the list, as is Oregon’s Crater Lake.
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