Autistic hiker safe after four nights

An autistic 18-year-old lost in the wilderness for four days was found alive Thursday, weak but apparently fine, and was reunited with his family, searchers said.

“To the best of our knowledge, he was just hungry and thirsty and fatigued,” Jim Reneau, one of the nine searchers who found Jacob Allen, said at a news conference at the command post near Davis, about 90 miles south of Pittsburgh.

Allen, who has the mental capacity of a 3- or 4-year-old, wandered away from his parents while hiking Sunday.

He was lying in a clearing about a mile from where his hat was found Monday when Reneau’s son, Jeremy, called out his name. Allen opened his eyes and rolled over to meet his rescuers.

“He was very quiet; he was nonverbal,” said Jeremy Reneau, 25, the first to spot Allen. “But you could tell by his body language he was hungry.”

Rescuers fed him candy bars and peanut butter sandwiches and tried to walk him out of the wooded Dolly Sods Wilderness Area, part of the Monongahela National Forest. When he became too tired, they carried him out on a litter.

“The family is all together,” search group spokesman Chris Stadelman said. “As soon as they heard the report he was alive and doing fairly well, they gathered in a prayer circle.”

The InterMountain newspaper reported that Allen was taken to Davis Memorial Hospital. A hospital spokeswoman declined to comment.

“I think the whole state’s relieved,” said Lara Ramsburg, spokeswoman for Gov. Joe Manchin III, who visited the Allen family Wednesday night. “We’re all relieved for him and his family.”

Allen had no food or water, but Stadelman had said there were water sources in the search area.

Temperatures dropped to as low as 38 degrees on the nights Allen was missing. He was wearing hiking boots, a long-sleeved T-shirt, a wind jacket and wind pants.