John Walker, a Special Agent with the South Dakota Office of the Attorney General, Division of Criminal Investigation, and LETA Instructor, traveled to the Rapid City Regional Airport to assist with the search. John brought with him a thermal imager and a pair of gyro-stabilized binoculars. At 11:00 p.m. he was met by Civil Air Patrol pilot Mike Beeson and Susan Phipps, a member of the Pennington County Search and Rescue team. After a quick briefing the three were airborne and a search of the river for the teens with the thermal imager began.

During the flight Agent Walker noticed a hot spot near the river in a ravine. The single hot spot did not move so the crew discounted the heat source and moved on. The search continued throughout the night for the missing teens with no success.

At 8:00 a.m. the next morning, flying over the river, Agent Walker spotted two inner tubes on a sand bar island six miles south of Wasta, South Dakota. Search and Rescue was notified and proceeded to the area. A second Civil Air Patrol aircraft assisting with the search and working further north located the two missing teens. The teens were cold and hungry but no injuries had occurred.

Later, both teens were interviewed about their harrowing experience. Both said they had heard the airplane the previous night but having no way to signal it they decided to stay huddled under their makeshift shelter in a ravine. The thermal image Agent Walker and his crew had observed the night before had in fact been the thermal image of the two missing teens, a sixteen-year-old male and his fifteen-year-old female companion.