Teams Scour Fort Hood For Missing Texas Soldier
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FORT HOOD, Texas — Teams of soldiers and civilians scoured the rugged Fort Hood terrain yesterday for a soldier missing since he set out on a solo navigation exercise three days earlier.
Military Black Hawks and a state helicopter searched for Sergeant Lawrence Sprader by sky as about 500 soldiers pored over 25 square miles of rolling terrain that includes scrubland and woods, authorities said.
Searchers were in all-terrain vehicles and on horseback, accompanied by bloodhounds from the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, said Colonel Diane Battaglia, a III Corps spokeswoman at the Central Texas Army post.
Sergeant Sprader, 24, was last heard from on Friday about an hour before he was supposed to have completed the six-hour solo navigational mission from the post.
“We think he got disoriented on the course and got misdirected,” Colonel Battaglia said. “In his last message, he said he reached a hard, paved road, and was instructed to call in if that happened. He wasn’t able to give any terms of reference as to where he was located.”
Temperatures crept into the mid-80s yesterday and were expected to reach into the 90s later in the day.
“The longer he goes without being resupplied with water or food, or if he is completely lost and disoriented, there would be fear for his physical well-being,” Colonel Battaglia said.
