The 3-year-old son of a Keizer couple with ties to Canby was found safe Saturday, after more than 17 hours alone in the woods near Gilchrist.
“Well, friends — God is still in the miracle-working business,” said family friend Lori Tisdale, who had previously called on people to pray for the safe return of the boy, Nolan Erion. Another friend’s post offering a similar message and call for prayer was shared more than 19,000 times.
Parents Sean and Raylene Erion reunited with their son shortly after noon Saturday. Search-and-rescue teams from seven counties and numerous other agencies had scoured the woods south of La Pine since the boy went missing around 8 p.m. the previous night, using K-9 teams, drones, searchers on foot and horseback, and even a helicopter equipped with thermal imaging.
Raylene Erion — whose parents, Don and Donna Morris, are former Canby residents — said Nolan was doing well.
“He is eating and drinking water and acting like nothing happened,” she said, according to the public Facebook post from Tisdale.
The boy reportedly was taken to Sky Lakes Medical Center in Klamath Falls for a check-up, but family and friends said he appeared to be just fine following his much-publicized adventure.
The search included teams from Klamath, Deschutes, Crook, Jefferson, Lake, Jackson and Siskiyou counties, along with air and ground resources from the Oregon Air National Guard, Oregon State Police, the U.S. Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management.
According to an earlier release from the Klamath County Sheriff’s Office, the family had been camping in the woods northeast of Gilchrist when Nolan wandered off in the night.
