Luck, volunteers, movie star played roles in Scout rescues

Like so many lost Utah Boy Scouts before him, Brennan Hawkins made it home alive.

The Bountiful boy's ordeal is nothing new to the state's history books — many Boy Scouts have been reported missing in Utah's vast forests. In 1989, a 10-year-old Scout survived five days in a Tooele County mine. And just last summer, another lost Scout was found in the High Uintas after two days of wandering.

"We have a tremendous batting record," said Kay Godfrey, spokesman for the Great Salt Lake Council of the Boy Scouts of America.

Of the 110,000 Scouts in the state who spent a total of just over a half-million nights in the wilds in 2003, four were lost and found safely a few days later.

But not every Scout has been so lucky.

The Bardsley family still mourns for their son, Garrett, who disappeared last August in the High Uintas. Garrett was a member of the Scout's Utah National Parks Council, based in Orem.

To this day, Garrett's father, Kevin Bardsley, returns to the Uintas to search for his son's remains. The 12-year-old Boy Scout vanished while camping at a lake about 21 miles from where Brennan wandered away last Friday.

Garrett proved to be the exception to the rule of happy endings.

Nobody thought 10-year-old Joshua Dennis would ever be found.

Missing for five days in an abandoned mine near Stockton, Tooele County, Joshua's survival was hailed as a miracle.

Joshua became lost in the labyrinth of tangled caverns of the Hidden Treasure Mine Sept. 22, 1989, while his Scout troop was exploring. More than 200 volunteers joined law enforcement teams in a massive search.

The Kearns boy sought refuge on a mine ledge 150 feet above the main floor of the mine and about 500 feet away from where he was last seen with his Boy Scout troop. Searchers passed by the perch daily without noticing a thing and began to lose hope of ever finding the boy.

It wasn't until five days later that three rescue workers heard a distant voice cry, "Help."

The boy suffered frostbite on several toes, dehydration and exhaustion.

A Hollywood superstar came to the rescue of another lost Utah Boy Scout.