Linda Mae Parrish, 41, vanished with three others after a sightseeing flight from Merrill Field in Anchorage in late June 1997. She was aboard a yellow and white Cessna 182, tail number N3186U, with her husband Monte Parrish and friends Donald and Karen Johnston. The group did not file a flight plan and the last confirmed sighting placed the aircraft over Denali National Park; radar data later indicated the plane was near the Kahiltna Peaks area before its transponder was lost.

An extensive multi-agency search followed, involving Elmendorf’s Rescue Coordination Center, National Guard C-130s and Pavehawks, Army Chinooks, the National Park Service Lama helicopter and as many as 16 Civil Air Patrol planes. No wreckage, emergency locator transmitter signal, or sign of the four people was ever found, and the official search was suspended after eight days. The prevailing explanation is a crash somewhere in the park’s vast, rugged terrain, but no physical evidence has been recovered.

Did anyone in the area at the time see the Cessna or notice anything unusual around Kahiltna Peaks that could help locate the wreckage?