EMIGRANT, Mont. — The Paradise Valley Fire Department responded to a call on the evening of June 23 requesting aid for a woman who had fallen into an embankment off of Old Yellowstone Trail.
As James Tiscione and a few other volunteer firefighters and an EMT, all with the Paradise Valley Fire Department, headed to the woman a second call came in with more details.
An 80-year-old Park County woman had crawled up a steep embankment after crashing her car. She had been stuck for two days.
“It was so unbelievable,” Tiscione said.
Ali Bakker, 80, was last seen on June 21 driving on East River Road in Paradise Valley.
A Missing Endangered Person Advisory was issued for her on June 23 at about 12:30 p.m. by the Montana Department of Justice and Park County Sheriff’s Office, with the information that Bakker had no cellphone and had recently been injured with a fracture and took pain medications.
Park County Undersheriff Clay Herbst said that the sheriff’s office opened an investigation into her whereabouts immediately after receiving the missing person’s report on Wednesday. A deputy began to review credit card records and bank statements to see if she’d left a trail.
But just about six hours later, Bakker had been found. The Chronicle was unable to reach Bakker for comment.
Bakker had crashed her car on Old Yellowstone Trail South, about two miles south of its intersection with U.S. Highway 89 S, on Tuesday, according to the sheriff’s office.
Her car slid down a steep embankment coming to a rest near the Yellowstone River. The car’s airbags deployed.
Herbst referred the Chronicle to Montana Highway Patrol for specific crash details. The Montana Highway Patrol trooper who investigated the crash was unavailable for comment on Tuesday.
Bakker stayed with her car — Herbst wasn’t sure if she’d lost consciousness at any point — but on June 23 she climbed up the embankment aided by a walking cane.
At the top of the road, she flagged down a passing car. The passengers of that car called 911.
“It was quite remarkable for an 80-year-old woman who had been (missing) for two days without water, food or heat and it appeared she crawled all the way up the hill with her cane,” said Phillip Hoag, an EMT with Paradise Valley Fire Department who responded on Thursday.
She complained of neck and back pain and had a bruised eye, Tiscione said. She was lying on the ground when first responders arrived, he said. She was taken by ambulance to Livingston HealthCare, Herbst said.
“We were very happy to hear she was found and sounds like she’s doing OK,” Herbst said.
On Friday, Livingston HealthCare declined to comment and would not confirm if Bakker was a patient. Law enforcement and first responders said Bakker was found in good health, with some minor injuries.
Tiscione, and other first responders, were coming off a busy week.
He was stationed at 5 a.m. on Monday at Carbella Bridge, which ultimately washed away.
“Just happy to report there were very little injuries and no deaths (due to flooding), but Ali was the result,” Tiscione said. “She wouldn’t have been on that road if there was no flood.”
Old Yellowstone Trail has been a detour to get to Tom Miner Basin since flooding washed out the Carbella Bridge on June 13.
The road has been improved, but Tiscione said it’s still “very twisty, windy and dangerous.”
Tiscione, who has been a firefighter and first responder in Paradise Valley for about a decade, said from a first responder’s perspective stories don’t often end like Bakker’s.
“It’s sometimes very rare that we can say ‘wow look how miraculous,’” he said. “It was impressive. At 80-years-old, that’s unbelievable.”
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