Body of woman who froze to death found on Immigrant Road

The Elmore County Sheriff's Office continued this week to investigate why a 38-year-old Mountain Home woman died from hypothermia after driving into the mountains east of town on New Year's Eve.

Members of Elmore County Search and Rescue found the body of Suzanne "Susie" Blythe on Jan. 1 near the Tollgate intersection of Highway 20 and Immigrant Road about 12 miles east of town. She had apparently left her vehicle and froze to death during the night.

The sheriff's office began the search after receiving a call from the boyfriend of Blythe's mother the afternoon of Dec. 31. Details of the phone call were not released to the Mountain Home News.

During the day, Blythe used her cell phone to send phone and text messages back and forth to her ex-husband, their children and other members of the family, according to Deputy Nancy Hawley, an investigator with the sheriff's department. Those involved in the case were not at liberty to discuss the contents of those messages. However, the investigator said Blythe sent conflicting information on her whereabouts to different family members, including at least one message saying she was leaving for another town.

According to Doug Croyle from the county dispatcher office, search teams knew Blythe was likely near the Immigrant Road turnoff. Her vehicle was found at the road's turnoff just off Highway 20.

By 4:30 p.m. Dec. 31, the sheriff's office called in six members of the Elmore County Search and Rescue and expanded its search for the missing woman. However, a winter storm set in over the mountains, bringing with it heavy snow and high winds that dropped visibility to near zero, according to Daryl Page, commander of the county search and rescue team.

"They could've walked five feet from her and never saw her," Croyle said.

"We were dead in the water," added Page as he described the challenge of trying to find Blythe in the dark, with the snow continuing to restrict their search efforts. As conditions on the mountain deteriorated, the search and rescue team called off their search around 7:30 p.m. Dec. 31.

Deputies Cathy Wolfe and Shaun Sterling returned to the search area later that night in hopes of finding Blythe. However, the worsening weather forced them to return to town by 1 a.m.

On the morning of Jan. 1, the rescue unit brought in another six-person team and split into three, two-person groups to cover the area near the Tollgate turnoff. However, the overnight storm had dropped more than a foot of snow in the primary search area, requiring the country county crew to bring in snowmobiles to continue their search.

"We got close to calling off the search again because of all the snow, combined with all the falling rain," Page said.

At 10:22 a.m., the rescue team commander received a call from one of his members that they had found Blythe's body on a rock outcropping about 200 yards from her car.

Despite the outcome, "I'm glad that we were able to find her because it allowed us to bring some closure to this case," Page said.