Julian Sands, the British star of films such as A Room With a View and Arachnophobia, has been identified as the hiker who has been missing in a California mountain range since last week.
The actor’s family and friends are clinging to hopes that he will be found safe, amid warnings of treacherous conditions for searching volunteers.
Sands, 65, has been missing in the Mount Baldy area since Friday 13 January, according to the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department.
The actor was thought to have been somewhere on the popular Baldy Bowl Trail, which climbs 3,900 feet over 4.5 miles to the highest summit in the San Gabriel Mountains.
Search and rescue crews looking for Sands had to suspend the search over the weekend because of avalanche threat, with authorities continuing to use drones.
The Independent understands that Sands’ son Henry has joined the search. He is retracing the route his father took, with the assistance of an experienced climber.
Images sent from Sands to his grandson Billy in September, which have been given exclusively to The Independent, show the father of three mountaineering.
California has been hit by a series of violent winter storms that have brought flooding and major snowfall in the past few weeks.
Sands, who lives in north Hollywood and has more than 150 movie TV credits to his name, most recently starred in the horror film The Ghosts of Monday.
Among his forthcoming releases is a thriller called Double Soul, co-starring F Murray Abraham.
