The Boot Standing Upright: How Craig Vanished into Heat and Stone

The Boot Standing Upright: How Craig Vanished into Heat and Stone The morning a boot stood perfectly upright in the middle of a service road, the canyon had already been baking eight to fourteen degrees above normal for days - and the boot belonged to a cautious, methodical civil engineer who filed trip plans and called his wife on schedule. How did a man who planned an east-side loop and carried a spare set of socks end up on the west talus where sandstone traps heat like an oven, leaving only a notebook stuck in a boulder crack to mark his last known movements? In this episode, we follow the timeline from Craig Donnelly signing the Paloma Canyon trail register to the discovery that contradicts every plan he filed with his wife and practiced for years. You’ll hear what the notebook recorded, where it was found, and the single unexplained detail that remained after the search closed: why was Craig on the west wall he deliberately avoided? Person: Craig Donnelly Date: June 14, 2009 (boot found at 7:41 a.m.) Location: Paloma Canyon, Dura County, New Mexico (west talus and service road) Status: Missing; search closed after seventy-two hours Occupation: Civil engineer, age 48 - Craig signed the trail register on June 6, 2009 at 8:52 a.m. and planned an eight-day loop. - A heat event raised canyon-floor temperatures 8-14°F above seasonal average for four consecutive days starting June 7. - The notebook contained entries for days one through three; the last entry was dated June 8 and listed mileage as 6.4 miles. - The notebook was found wedged in a boulder crack roughly 200 feet above the canyon floor on the west talus on June 15. - A boot belonging to Craig was found standing upright in the center of a service road at 7:41 a.m, on June 14. To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com. © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved. This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: [email protected].