THE LAY OF THE LAND- Part 1

Let's gradually zoom in on the scene of the events in question, using Google Earth ™ mapping services.

Jack Gordon disappeared on October 2, 2008 in Costilla County in south central Colorado about 80 miles north of Taos NM, 30 miles east of Alamosa CO and 50 miles west of Walsenburg CO.

Located in south central Colorado, the San Luis Valley is a high mountain plain bounded by the Sangre de Cristo Mountains on the east and the San Juan Mountains on the west. The valley comes to its northern apex at Poncha Pass just south of Salida. At its southern end the valley merges into northern New Mexico.

 Alamosa is the largest town in the Valley.  Highway 160 traverses the San Luis Valley from La Veta pass in the east to Wolf Creek Pass in the west. Costilla County is the southeasternmost of the five counties in the San Luis Valley.

The northeastern part of Costilla county contains the subdivided Forbes Ranch, including the Sangre de Cristo Ranches.

The Ranches are traversed by a dense network of dirt roads and are comprised of several thousand five-acre ranchette lots. One of these lots is the site of Jack Gordon’s home building site on Luke Road.  This is the general setting of the Mysterious Disappearance...







ORIGINALLY POSTED 6/7/2012
RE-POSTED 10/29/2012

SEARCH AND RESCUE

     Based on the initial presumption that Jack Gordon had suffered some type of medical event, our first efforts focused on the immediate vicinity of the house on Luke Road, in rural Costilla County on the eastern edge of the San Luis Valley.
     Within about 36 hours of the time Jack was last seen, leaving his apartment in Fort Garland to drive out to the homesite on Luke Road, Costilla County Search and Rescue was on the scene. On Friday October 3, 2008 a general area quadrant search was undertaken by several team members on ATV's and on horseback, covering about a one mile circular perimeter centered on Jack's homesite. The searchers focused on roadways and trails, not much off road searching was done. No trace of Jack was found.
     On Sunday, October 5, 2008 a close interval line search was carried out by about 30-40 volunteers under the direction of the SAR team covering a radius of about 1/3 mile without results.
     On Monday, October 6, 2008 an air tracker dog team was brought in and performed a search for about a 1/4 mile perimeter. No trace of Jack was found away from the house.  Individual searches were also carried out on two other five acre properties that Jack owned in the area, with no trace.
     These satellite views from Google Earth ™ mapping services show the general area of the events. For a wider perspective, check here.
    
     On this map, the dark red square is an approximation of Jack's five-acre property, the pink inner circle is the area covered by the close interval search, and the lighter outer circle is the approximate perimeter covered by the general area search (one mile radius from Jack's place).

     The second pushpin is the house of Jack's neighbor John, who was mentioned in the original police report. That house is just over 1/2 mile from Jack's house. Oddly enough, the neighbor John disappeared from the Fort Garland area on the saame day Jack disappeared.  His mother told the Sheriff that he moved out of the state. We don't know if the Sheriff ever contacted him.  We don't know if he knows anything about that day.