On February 18, 2026, at 4 pm, SBHC welcomes Oro Valley resident Butch Farabee (Career U.S. National Park Service - NPS Ranger) to talk about park search and rescue. The program is at the SaddleBrooke One Activity Center.
Farabee sitting on a bag of marijuana on a frozen lake in Yosemite in 1977. This incident will be highlighted in the program. Credit NPS
In 2024, over 4 million visitors came to Yosemite - the great majority of them returned home safe and sound. But not all of them! In the last fifty years, there have been some 8,500 Search and Rescue (SAR) missions in the park. YOSAR “Yosemite Search and Rescue” is one of the elite mountain rescue teams in the world. Using many outstanding and rare photos, Butch Farabee (a ranger in Yosemite for almost ten years), will show and discuss many of these incidents. Butch has written five books on SAR, one winning the National Outdoor Book Award, 2017. He is also on the Board of the Friends of Yosemite Search and Rescue. In his 35-year career with the National Park Service (NPS), he has been involved with some 900 SARs and oversaw the SAR Program for the NPS for four years.
Butch Farabee grew up in Tucson; and as an Eagle Scout went on his first search in 1958, one of the largest in Arizona history. Butch is a:
· 1960 Alum from Tucson High
· A graduate from the University of Arizona with a BS in Zoology
· A graduate of the FBI Academy
· Has a MA in Public Administration
· Served three years on the Tucson Police Department
· Has a long career in the National Park Service with service in 11 parks
· Parks include Grand Canyon, Sequoia, Death Valley, Kings Canyon, and Lake Mead
Butch retired in 2000 as the Acting Superintendent of Glacier National Park. He then spent much of the next five years managing five Texas State Parks. Farabee has been involved in SAR for some 900+ operations.
He was the National Park Service’s first Emergency Services Coordinator for four years. In his nearly ten years in Yosemite, he was a Deputy Coroner for seven years and oversaw SAR at the Grand Canyon for six.
He is most proud, however, of his two sons and their families - including four grandkids. Bruce stated:
“If I could do it over, I would again choose being a National Park Ranger.”