How to React if Your Child Is Lost in the Woods

Resist the initial urge to panic when you realize your child may be lost. This panic merely complicates the situation and drains you of the energy you'll need to recover your child.

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderate

Things You’ll Need:

• Camping Lanterns
• Whistles
• Flashlights

1. Contact authorities immediately. Give them a physical description of your child, your child's intended destination, favorite spots, and so on. Names and locations of some close friends and the circumstances surrounding the incident may also help. The more information you can give the authorities, the better equipped they are to help you.
2. Recruit others to help you and begin a circular search of your camping area, spiraling outward for quite a distance. Make sure someone remains in the camp (or at home) in case the child returns on his or her own.
3. Start a base of operations for your search so that everyone can consult a central place to find out if the child has been recovered yet.
4. Call out the child's name. Blow a whistle if one is available.
5. Have friends search out all local waterways and bodies of water; lost children are frequently found near bodies of water.
6. Work with authorities, not against them. Don't withhold any information or get in the way of their search. Tell them as much as you can.
7. Keep in mind that sheriff departments, fire departments and rangers are usually trained in search and rescue and know the best course of action to take to find your child. They also have resources at their disposal to aid the search, such as helicopters, dogs and professional trackers.
8. Stay positive and hopeful. Most lost children are found the same day, or within 48 hours, but a crafty child can survive alone in the wilderness for several weeks.

Tips & Warnings

• Teach your children to stay put, think clearly, and avoid panicking if they get lost. Also brief your children on survival skills so that they can survive alone in the wilderness should they need to.
• If you are far from help, send a runner to contact authorities while everyone else begins a search. Keep your search organized and relatively close so no one else ends up lost.
• If your child becomes lost after dark, make as large a source of light as you can (a fire, a lantern or waving flashlights), and keep making noise for the child to follow. Noise carries better at night.
• Remember that panicking will merely hinder your search for a lost child.
• Do not send other children out looking for your child.
• Search in teams, never alone.