Incident at Big Sky: The Inside Story of the Search for Two Savage Killers in Montana

In July 1984, biathlete Kari Swenson, a Bozeman resident training for the World Biathlon Championship, went missing near Big Sky Resort in Montana. Sheriff Johnny France of Madison County, a former rodeo cowboy who had held the position for three years, led the investigation. What initially appeared to be a grizzly bear attack was revealed to be a kidnapping: Kari had been taken at gunpoint by Don and Dan Nichols, a father-and-son pair of survivalists who had lived in the wilderness for years. They intended to make her a "mountain woman" and Dan's bride, but their plan quickly deteriorated. After a deadly firefight with rescuers, the kidnappers fled into the Spanish Peaks terrain. As summer turned to brutal winter blizzards, SWAT teams, forest rangers, and antiterrorist units searched the backcountry with minimal sightings. A report of a strange campfire on a slope above the Madison River led Sheriff France to enter the forest alone to confront the fugitives. This encounter became a significant moment in the five-month manhunt. Incident at Big Sky recounts this true story of the abduction and the search for justice, drawing on France's firsthand account of events that made international headlines.