Hope, heartbreak fill search for firefighter

Chicago Tribune ^ | 6-1-03 | Rudolph Bush

[JustPiper]

Hope, heartbreak fill search for firefighter - Wife tries to stay focused on hunt

The dining room table is covered with the search for firefighter David Scott Welch.

His wife, Julie, and her two sisters are hunched over it--legal pads and cell phones, fliers and spreadsheets around them--checking off a list of tasks aimed at finding a man who, on one perfectly normal night, had dinner with his wife, went to bed and disappeared.

The last sign of Welch, 46, a respected Chicago Fire Department lieutenant, came at 1:22 a.m. May 22, when, at his home computer, he apparently sent an e-mail that friends and family can hardly believe he would have written.

[JustPiper]

An Update Ping!

[JustPiper]

Chicago Update!

[JustPiper]

She has marshaled her family and friends and a willing Fire Department into an organized search force.
Husband an outdoorsman

Her husband, a hunter and a fisherman, prefers the woods and the open air, something she thinks he might have found in Hobart.

"I see him living out of his truck," she said.
She wonders if he drove to Florida, where they have vacationed and were considering buying a condominium.

Coming from a man who never sent an e-mail longer than two or three words and who was intensely private, especially about anything that might be wrong with him, the note seemed inconceivable.

"It's just not him," said Julie Welch's cousin, Tim Turbak.

She called the police in the small Wisconsin town where they have a cottage.

No money is gone from their banking account. The credit card has not been used.

"I think [in his note] he's telling me, `I'm doing all this for you," she said. "He doesn't realize that the best thing he can do for me is to come home."

[JustPiper]

Could someone Ping the Florida Chapter please?

[Brad’s Gramma]

Just a test.....seeing if this way works.

[JustPiper]

FireFighter Ping:

Engine Company 70, Battalion 9, and Ambulance 13

We need to help this poor woman, they have no children and are trying every facet to get help to find him. He may be in Indiana, Wisconsin, Florida and presumably out of his truck. Please ping all you know to be on the lookout for:

Welch's vehicle, a 2000 hunter green Dodge Ram with Illinois license plates 9913JX

5 feet 10 inches tall and weighs 190 pounds. He has brown eyes and brown hair and is balding.

The truck has a Firefighter sticker in the windshield.

[Soaring Feather]

bump

[JustPiper]

Thanx Gram ;)

[JustPiper]

presumably out of his truck.

Was meant to say living out of his truck.

[concentric circles]

green Dodge Ram bump.

9913JX

Blue jeans and a flannel shirt or T-shirt. He smokes and wears sunglasses and a baseball cap.

[Johnny Gage]

Firefighter Update PING!

[Dubya]

Thanks for the ping.

[amom]

Thanks for the update ping. Thoughts for his safe return. Hoping this is just a trouble that passes swiftly.

[SAMWolf]

Thanks for the ping and the update.

[Victoria Delsoul]

Thanks for the update.

[TEXOKIE]

Prayer bump for the wife, family, loved ones and those searching. Dear God, please help this missing one return home.

[photogirl]

Bump

[JustPiper]

Well, Johnny have yet to hear back yet from his wife. My Mom used to say 'no news is good news', I hope this means maybe he is ok, nothing heard from yet. I want to make a homepage for this and I hope John Walsh will profile it on AMW or his daily show.

[Otta B Sleepin]

Prayer BUMP for David and his wife.