A missing hiker has been found after spending nine days lost in the Himalayan foothills in northern India.
According to reports, the hiker, Samuel Vengrinovich, 44, survived the ordeal despite limited access to food and water. He also had a broken arm.
“He ate insects along the way to survive and was following the river to get to Dharamshala village,” Vengrinovich’s sister, Natasha, told The Jerusalem Post.
The saga began on June 5 when Vengrinovich, an Israeli-American, went disappeared while hiking near the town of Dharamshala. The town is the modern-day spiritual center of Tibetan Buddhism, and it is the home of the religion’s leader, the Dalai Lama.
According to multiple reports, Vengrinovich told family members that, after hearing the Dalai Lama speak, he planned to hike a nearby route called the Triund Hill Trek. He had rented a tent and other outdoor gear, and planned on a two-day hike, beginning on June 6.
But when other hikers noticed that he hadn’t returned to their group campsite by June 9, they contacted his sister, Natasha, who raised the alarm. “His tent and a majority of his clothes and his phone are still at the campsite,” Natasha told J. Weekly. “He went hiking with a backpack, with, from our understanding, a day of food.”
Natasha told Fox news station KTVU in San Francisco that Sam left his cell phone at the campsite and attempted to ascend to the snow line on a nearby ridge. She said that Sam saw other hikers as he ascended, but he reached higher altitudes by himself.
Vengrinovich, was raised in California, the son of Jewish Russian immigrants, but has been living in Israel for the past 14 years. “Sam wasn’t just another backpacker. He was on a mission—to heal,” his friend Eliyahu Freedman wrote in The Times of Israel. Freedman said that Vengrinovich was in India looking for solace due to the recent hostilities in the Middle East.
His disappearance prompted a sizable search and rescue mission. Vengrinovich’s parents, Vlad and Tina, started an online fundraiser with the stated goal of $100,000 to cover the efforts. They told media outlets they were paying “$6,000 for local search teams, including equipment and management” as well as $40,000 to fly in an Israeli delegation, which consisted of “alpinists, flight costs, and equipment” for four days of searching, and an additional $20,000 for helicopter search and rescue.
Vengrinovich was finally found by rescuers on Sunday, June 15, and sent to a hospital in India to recover. In a note on his GoFundMe page, which has raised over $66,000 at the time of publication, Vlad Vengrinovich wrote that Samuel still “faces significant medical care and hospitalization for his injuries.”
“We still need your help!” the note reads. “We urgently need help to cover the immediate costs of the rescue operation. The incredible teams who searched for Samuel, day and night, require payment now, regardless of the outcome. In addition, Samuel faces significant medical care and hospitalization for his injuries, along with flights to reunite him with his family. Please continue to donate and share.”
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