Team Pulls Dazed Mom to Safety at Landfill

GRANADA HILLS —  Using infrared sensors mounted on a sheriff’s rescue helicopter, authorities located a missing woman in the Sunshine Canyon Landfill on Monday evening, nearly 14 hours after her young son was found wandering alone in the dump.

Authorities found 39-year-old Ngoc Tuy Thi Phan of Westminster--who had been missing since Friday--at the bottom of a ravine filled with thick brush and trees around 8:10 p.m.

“She was surprised, and she was staring straight ahead,” said Fred Koegler, a member of the Montrose Search and Rescue Team, which pulled Phan from the ravine. “I think she was dazed from all the activity. She drank water out of the creek and had a bag full of leaves she had sucked on for moisture.”

“She was incoherent, and her clothes were torn,” added Mark Millis, another team member. “She had no shoes, no socks, no covering whatsoever on her feet. She was muddy, but it didn’t look like she was bleeding.

“She was kind of apprehensive about us getting her out,” Millis said. “She wasn’t sure who we were or what we were going to do.”

Phan was taken by ambulance to Providence Holy Cross Medical Center in Mission Hills, where authorities said she was in good condition.

Phan apparently drove into the landfill property with her son sometime Friday after an argument with her father, according to Los Angeles Police Lt. Anthony Alba.

She was suffering from a mental condition and had not been taking her prescribed medication, Alba said.

But it wasn’t until Monday at 6 a.m. that police were called in to search for her after a caretaker at the 400-acre landfill found her 8-year-old son, Richard, wandering near the caretaker’s trailer.

The boy was “dusty, with dirt all over him, hungry and thirsty,” said Arney Berghoff, a spokesman for Browning Ferris Industries, which owns the landfill.

Caretaker Sonny Garcia took Richard into his home, where he helped him clean up, fed him and called authorities, Berghoff said.

Richard said their car, a 1991 four-door green Honda Accord, broke down on a hillside dirt access road, prompting the two to look for help. When Richard became tired, his mother took him back to the car and told him to stay put while she resumed a search for assistance, Alba said.

When his mother did not return, Richard left the car and went looking for a way out. Alba said investigators think he might have been wandering in the area since Friday.

Search-and-rescue teams found the car in O’Melveny Park, which adjoins the landfill.

By Monday afternoon police had found various items belonging to Phan--her purse, identification, a single shoe, broken glasses and her medication--a few miles northwest of the car, near a steep, hilly area of the landfill, according to LAPD Officer Sally Barnes.

The area where the purse was found was so treacherous, she said, it would be safe only for expert hikers or mountain climbers. Barnes added the area had numerous species of wildlife, including bears, mountain lions and snakes.

Alba theorized that because of Phan’s mental state, she might have been be trying to hide from them in the landfill. But the reason for her disappearance was not clear Monday night.

The landfill straddles the Los Angeles city-county line in Granada Hills, abutting O’Melveny Park and a mountainous, sparsely populated wilderness area. The facility is open to the public through the main entrance and various fire roads, Berghoff said.

By late Monday afternoon volunteer search-and-rescue teams, aided by bloodhounds and equestrian units, joined the LAPD and Los Angeles County sheriff’s units already on scene.

Alba estimated there were more than 100 people involved in the rescue. But it wasn’t until after nightfall that helicopters located the woman.

Richard was taken to Providence Holy Cross Medical Center and later transferred to Queen of Angels Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center, where he was placed in the intensive care unit, Alba said. He was being treated for dehydration, exposure and minor cuts.

Times staff writer Boris Yaro contributed to this story.