Story highlights A man goes missing after he leaves his house on September 2 
 
 Nearly seven weeks later, he is found hundreds of miles away 
 
 He's found injured and trapped in a ravine; he used the time to write love letters to his family 
 
 His death leaves behind many questions 
 
 David Welch hopped into his maroon Pontiac Montana van last month and drove for hours. Without saying where he was going, he kept on driving, police say. 
 
 Nearly seven weeks later, a hitchhiker found him in a deep, isolated desert patch in Utah, hundreds of miles from his Kansas home. 
 
 Injured and trapped in his car, he'd spent his final days penning love letters to his wife of 32 years and four sons. 
 
 Authorities say his car plummeted into the ravine in early September after it veered off the road. 
 
 Welch, 54, sat in his mangled car for days, maybe weeks, police say. Nights became days, then weeks, then over a month. 
 
 And as his family searched for him, he was trapped in his car, scribbling his last words. 
 
 What's in the notes is private, authorities say, and they have been handed over to Welch's family. 
 
 His family's ordeal started September 2 when he left his home in Manhattan, Kansas. 
 
 A day later, relatives contacted the police to report that he had not returned home. 
 
 "At this time officers confirmed that there was no reason to believe Welch was currently in danger of harm or had known medical issues that may cause him to be in danger," the Riley County Police Department said. 
 
 It said it notified law enforcement agencies in areas where Welch may have gone. 
 
 Four days after he left home, a missing persons report was filed. Long stretches of time passed with no news of his whereabouts. 
 
 The retired Pepsi Co. representative was an avid outdoorsman who loved landscaping, scuba diving and snowskiing, according to his obituary posted on a funeral home's website 
 
 Forty-six days after he left home -- on October 18 -- a pedestrian walking along the edge of the desolate road saw an overturned car in a deep ravine. 
 
 It was about 850 miles from his home on a deserted section off Interstate 70. 
 
 Tire marks led straight off the road down to where his vehicle crashed, authorities said. 
 
 It didn't appear that he was braking or attempting a turn, just that he went straight off the road, said Cpl. Todd Johnson, a spokesman for the Utah Highway Patrol. 
 
 Authorities believe Welch fell asleep while driving, sending the car crossing into the ravine and rolling onto its passenger side, CNN affiliate KSNT reported. 
 
 Welch was trapped alive in the ravine for an unknown number of days. 
 
 He was found dead. What police don't know is how long he lived. 
 
 And with his passing, a lot of questions remain, like why was he so far away from home? ||||| Final goodbyes • He wrote love notes to his family in his last days. 
 
 This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2013, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted. 
 
 David Welch spent the last days of his life trapped down a dusty ravine in the Utah desert, scrawling love notes to the family he mysteriously left hundreds of miles away. 
 
 Welch's story begins the evening of Sept. 2, when without a word to anyone he climbed into his maroon Pontiac van and drove away from his home in Manhattan, Kan. Within hours, his family contacted the Riley County Police Department, but spokesman Matthew Droge said searches and a subsequent missing-person report never turned up anything. 
 
 For the next month and a half, there were no clues to Welch's whereabouts. 
 
 Then, on the morning of Oct. 18, a hitchhiker in Utah rounded a bend along a barren stretch of Interstate 70  about 47 miles outside of Green River and nearly 900 miles from Welch's home. It's a desolate area, parched beneath relentless summer sun. 
 
 "It's a pretty lonely stretch out there," Utah Highway Patrol Lt. Scott Robertson said of the region. ||||| Gastonia Police Chief Robert Helton, left, listens as Ian Ritch speaks during a press conference Wednesday, Sept. 26, 2018, in Gastonia, N.C., about his 6-year-old son Maddox Ritch who disappeared while... (Associated Press) 
 
 Gastonia Police Chief Robert Helton, left, listens as Ian Ritch speaks during a press conference Wednesday, Sept. 26, 2018, in Gastonia, N.C., about his 6-year-old son Maddox Ritch who disappeared while they were visiting Rankin Lake Park near downtown Gastonia Saturday, Sept. 22, 2018. (John Clark... (Associated Press) 
 
 GASTONIA, N.C. (AP) — The chief of a North Carolina police department said Thursday he was "heartbroken" over the discovery of a body believed to be that of a missing 6-year-old boy. 
 
 Gastonia Police Chief Robert Helton fought back tears and a breaking voice during a news conference in which it was announced officials believed the body searchers found was that of Maddox Ritch. 
 
 "Our community's heartbroken. This is not the end that we hoped for," Helton said. "I've lost a lot of sleep this week worrying about Maddox." 
 
 Gastonia Fire Chief Phil Welch said the body was found in a creek, slightly more than a mile (1.6 kilometers) east of Rankin Lake Park, by a searcher who was walking down the middle of the creek as his partners stood on the bank. He said the area had been searched previously by drones, all-terrain vehicles and foot patrols. 
 
 Welch said a crew of 15 searchers returned to the creek and discovered the body. 
 
 "There is no sense of accomplishment here today," Welch said. "There is grieving down at our command post." 
 
 FBI agent Jason Kaplan, also fighting tears, said the investigation into what happened to Maddox will continue. He said the water wasn't more than 3 feet (0.9 meters) deep at the spot where the body was found, adding that it's too early to say whether foul play was involved. Neither he nor the other officials would provide additional details regarding the body being found, including how long the body had been in the creek. 
 
 Last Saturday, Maddox Ritch's father said the boy ran off from him and a friend at the park and disappeared before he could catch up to him. 
 
 The news release says the boy's parents have been notified about the body being found, and police scheduled a news conference for later in the afternoon. 
 
 Both parents went before the media this week to plead for any information that would lead to the discovery of Maddox, who was autistic. On Wednesday, Ian Ritch appeared on national television and at a news conference to repeat the pleas. 
 
 According to the boy's father, Ian Ritch, Maddox was about 25 feet to 30 feet (7 meters to 9 meters) away before he broke into a sprint just as a jogger passed them. The father said he is a diabetic and because he has neuropathy in his feet, he has trouble running. 
 
 "He likes running," Ritch said. "I couldn't catch up with him. I feel guilt for letting him get so far ahead of me before I started running after him." 
 
 Ritch said the boy looked back at him and laughed, adding that he would slow down and then speed up again. With the help of the friend, Ritch searched for his son but couldn't find him. Park personnel also joined in the search but didn't see Maddox, either. After an hour, Ritch called 911, saying he delayed that call because he thought he would find his son and there was no reason to call police.
– A sad, strange tale out of Utah: A 54-year-old man who set off from Kansas on an unexplained road trip crashed his vehicle in remote Utah, and it wasn't until seven weeks later that a hiker spotted the wreck with David Welch's body inside, reports CNN. But there's also this detail: Welch survived for days and perhaps weeks while trapped in his van and used the time to write love letters to his wife and four sons, reports the Salt Lake City Tribune. It remains unclear why Welch took off without explanation on Sept. 2. His family notified authorities that very day that he was missing, but subsequent searches turned up nothing. His final notes aren't being made public. Police speculate that Welch fell asleep at the wheel, causing his vehicle to go off a curve and into a ravine below. He was about 900 miles away from home. "It’s a pretty lonely stretch out there," says a Utah Highway Patrolman.