A Brownwood woman who never made it to a family reunion in Oklahoma over the weekend was found 48 hours after crashing into a ravine, according to her granddaughter Lynzee Mobley of Dublin.
75-year-old Wanda Mobley had attempted to travel alone to McAlester, Oklahoma for the reunion and had taken a wrong turn in Breckenridge. At approximately 9:30-10:30 a.m. Friday, June 26, on Hwy 183 just four miles outside of Seymour, Texas where she had planned to eat lunch and call family, she swerved to miss an animal that had darted onto the roadway, explained Lynzee. Her vehicle left the roadway and crashed into a ravine out of the view of traffic.The family had called Brown County Sheriff’s Office to report Mrs. Mobley as missing when she did not arrive at a hotel in McAlester, Oklahoma. Unfortunately, law enforcement is not able to issue a Silver Alert (missing person bulletin for an elderly individual) if a person is “of sound mind.” Lynzee stated that this frustrated her family who knew their grandmother would not wander off at her own will, but that something had to be wrong. They worried that she was in danger or had had an accident and began searching themselves.
BSCO Captain Vance Hill stated that deputies were sent out to Mobley’s home Friday to make sure there was no sign of foul play. An “attempt to locate” was issued to counties between Brown County and her destination, so that law enforcement would be on the lookout for her, said Hill. Her identification and vehicle description were filed with the Texas Crime Information Center and the National Crime Information Center, according to Hill.
“The Silver Alert was not issued to media, because she was of sound mind,” said Lynzee, stating that the alert has many flaws that could be life threatening. “Law enforcement would not ‘ping’ her cell phone on Friday night,” said Lynzee. It wasn’t until Saturday night that they pinged the phone to locate her and discovered that Mrs. Mobley had attempted to use her phone three times Friday afternoon to call for help, according to Lynzee.
“Had the Silver Alert been issued, we would have found her sooner and she wouldn’t have had to sit out there for 48 hours,” said Lynzee.
Although the family knows that law enforcement’s hands are tied as to when they can begin the missing person alerts and formalities of a search, they feel changes in the protocol of the alert need to be made. Possibly some exceptions made in cases like Mobley’s.
According to Lynzee, the windshield of Mobley’s vehicle had cracked and she was able to break it just enough to climb out of the vehicle after the crash. She attempted to go to the road for help but was unable to climb out of the ravine and instead kept cool during day by putting her feet in the cool water of a creek and then sat on rocks to stay warm at night, stated Lynzee.
Mobley told family after being located that she was certain she wasn’t going to be found.
Lynzee explained that Mobley told family members she had prayed to God that if she was going to die, to just take her now and not make her suffer or if not, if there was another purpose that she needed to live for, to give her the strength to do so.
Meanwhile the family made plans and left the Dublin area at approximately 11:30 p.m. Saturday and arrived in Seymour at about 2:00 a.m. Sunday morning. This is where the cell phone pings indicated she might be located. A search party of family members and friends from the Wichita Falls area had been searching for Mobley but had stopped for the night. The Dublin group of family and friends picked up the search at approximately 6:30 a.m. just as daylight broke. Lynzee stated that her brother-in-law saw a damaged road sign as they had come into Seymour and felt led to search that area first. With daylight, the family was able to see scattered pieces of what looked to be car parts and their search into the ravine led them to find Mrs. Mobley and her crashed vehicle. They called law enforcement and by 7:45 a.m. Sunday had an ambulance to help move her from the crash site for treatment/evaluation. She was taken to the hospital in Seymour and later transferred to a hospital in Wichita Falls.
Lynzee stated that surprisingly, considering all that she went through, Mrs. Mobley suffered a compression fracture in the middle of her back. When she was found, her body temperature was 92°, so she was borderline hypothermic, according to Lynzee.
“I truly believe it was God leading us to her all along. It was a sign (seeing the damaged road sign) but it was not the right time. Had we searched at night, we may not have seen the car and thought she wasn’t there. This totally renewed my faith in God and has given our family a huge testimony,” said Lynzee. “We are hoping that her experience will lead to awareness of the flaws in the Silver Alert system so that no one else has to go through what she did. I believe this is her purpose.”
Lynzee summed up the weekend’s events, “This was a very wonderful outcome to a very scary situation.”
Pictured above and below are photos of the accident scene. Photos contributed by Lynzee Mobley.
Mrs. Mobley recovering at the hospital after the accident.
Mrs. Mobley pictured with her son, Danny Mobley, prior to the accident.
