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Greg Shuping (center) briefs media outlets during the July 2019 search for Kevin Lynch in National Park lands near The Swag. Lynch was ultimately found safe after a five-day search. Donated photo
Greg Shuping was 19 years old when he launched his emergency services career in his native Burke County. The son of a volunteer firefighter, Shuping had spent most of his life hanging around the firehouse, at least when he wasn’t busy exploring nearby Linville Gorge.
As a teenager, Shuping struggled to settle on a clear direction for his post-high school life, but his dad, a state employee, handed him a simple piece of advice.
Kyle James, field team lead for Haywood Search and Rescue, carefully crosses a tributary of the West Fork Pigeon River. Nancy East photo
It was the fall of 2019, and Bill Zimmerman had just hopped in a truck with other members of the Haywood County Wilderness Search and Rescue Team in response to one of the 21 deployments the crew handled that year.
“Somebody goes, ‘We don’t even have a gas card. We don’t even have money to put into the truck to get up to the mountain,’” Zimmerman recalled.
It was a crystallizing moment for Zimmerman, who had for some time been toying with the idea of starting up an organization dedicated to funding the SAR team. That day served as the catalyst that spurred him to action, and now Zimmerman is president of the newly formed nonprofit WNC Wilderness Safety Fund.