PORT ANGELES — Clallam County sheriff’s deputies and the family of Robert “Bob” Goss combed the Agnew area Thursday for the missing 78-year-old while Coast Guard members looked from the air, but no sign was found of the man who has been missing for four days.
Goss, who suffers from dementia, took his sister’s keys to her silver 2006 Jeep Cherokee and left the home they share on Finn Hall Road between Port Angeles and Sequim sometime before dawn Monday.
His sister, Mary Ann Hudson, believes he went out to buy a Coca Cola and got lost.
“It was a total impulse thing on his part,” she said.
Detective Sgt. Lyman Moores scoured the area where the family believes Goss may have gone — the triangle between Old Olympic Highway and U.S. Highway 101 from Agnew west — but found no clues.
Moores asked the Coast Guard to divert a helicopter training mission over the area Thursday. Crew members saw nothing.
Extra patrols
Deputies have been making extra patrols this week through the Agnew area and south along O’Brien Road to look for Goss and the Jeep, Moores said.
“We are trying to do everything we can possibly do,” Moores said.
“I want to stay positive. Let’s hope that there may be an explanation.”
Family members have urged the Sheriff’s Office to launch a search-and-rescue operation in the area where a utility worker reported seeing Goss on Monday morning.
The utility worker believed Goss turned off Old Olympic Highway traveling west on Heuslein Road.
“This is that make-or-break day,” said Thomas Goss, Bob Goss’ son, who phoned the Peninsula Daily News on Thursday from his home in New Zealand.
“If a search is not mounted today, he might not be found alive.”
Sheriff Bill Benedict said a full-scale search-and-rescue operation wasn’t launched because the office lacks enough information on Goss’ whereabouts.
The Sheriff’s Office issued an missing/endangered person alert Tuesday and sent fliers to law enforcement agencies up and down the west coast.
“I was very pleased and very impressed with the personal touch,” Hudson said of Moores’ efforts Thursday.
In the area?
Family members feel sure Goss is somewhere in the greater Port Angeles-Sequim area.
Gas was low in Hudson’s Jeep, and the debit card that Goss was carrying hasn’t been used since his disappearance. He did not carry cash.
Hudson, who is Goss’ caregiver and has access to his bank account, goes online to check for transactions twice an hour.
Thomas Goss said his father is easily confused and hasn’t driven a car in about two years.
He said his father has problems with basic motor skills, such as standing up.
He suspects his father got lost on a rural road or a private driveway and perhaps got stuck in the mud trying to turn around.
Family members said Bob Goss was raised in Arkansas and taught young service members how to speak German. He was also an academic.
“He was a professor of German languages at San Bernardino State,” Thomas Goss said.
“He was a very literate and intelligent guy. He did a lot of teaching, and he worked in Silicon Valley writing technical manuals.”
Bob Goss has another son, Daniel, and a daughter, Erica.
“They’re all very accomplished kids,” Hudson said.
Bob Goss moved from the Sacramento area to live with his sister about two years ago.
Anyone with information on Bob Goss’ whereabouts is asked to phone the Clallam County Sheriff’s Office at 360-417-2459.
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Reporter Rob Ollikainen can be reached at 360-417-3537 or at rob.ollikainen@peninsuladailynews.com.
