NEW PORTLAND — A New Hampshire man whose body was found by game wardens Sunday in the woods of New Portland died doing what he liked best – deer hunting – his brother said Monday.
“That’s the only solace I have. He died doing what he loved to do,” Steve Babula said of his brother Todd Babula in the small, rustic cabin the brothers owned on Route 27, just over the town line in New Vineyard.
Steve Babula, 54, said he still doesn’t know how his brother died, but thinks it must have been a medical event, because he was found lying on the ground with his rifle propped up next to him. It was not a hunting-related shooting incident, he said.
Todd Babula, 59, of Portsmouth, New Hampshire, was found about 3:30 p.m. Sunday by game wardens doing a “hasty search” for known tree stands he used. The heavily wooded area is located north of the ITS 84 snowmobile trail between Route 27 and Atwood Hill Road in New Portland.
The New Portland Fire Department also assisted, as did local hunters. The Office of Chief Medical Examiner was notified, but there was no official word Monday on the cause of death.
Todd Babula was a commercial painter who owned a boat and liked to fish for lobster and tuna, his brother said. He was not married, but is survived by a daughter and a grandson who live in the Kittery and Portsmouth area.
Game wardens began searching for Babula after he was reported missing Saturday by his uncle, Robert Jones of Farmington, who visits the camp daily when his nephews are there during hunting season.
Todd Babula
“He didn’t sleep the night before, either. He came right from his job,” Jones, 87, said Monday. “He drove up and was in such a hurry to get out in the woods and go hunting that he’d been waiting a year to do. He came in and didn’t even sleep. He must have gone out just about dark and went out to his tree stand.”
Babula’s vehicle became stuck on a woods road sometime Friday morning. Babula made arrangements to have neighbors assist him in freeing the truck later in the afternoon, according to Lt. Kevin Adam, search and rescue coordinator for the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries & Wildlife.
Jones dropped him off to hunt near his truck about 1 p.m. Friday. Babula was reported missing by his uncle about 5 p.m. Saturday. Game wardens responded, found Babula’s vehicle and tried to find him Saturday night.
They resumed the search Sunday morning with tracking dogs, Maine Warden Service aircraft and local residents searching the woods and scouting tree stands that Babula frequented.
Steve Babula said he provided wardens with coordinates of the area on topographical maps.Wardens then used their own GPS devices to identify an area that they had not yet searched, he said. That’s where they found Todd Babula.
“They couldn’t find him. It snowed after, so it wasn’t like they had boot tracks,” Steve Babula said. “We have a lot of places to hunt here. We’ve been hunting up here since the ’60s. He knew the woods very well. It wasn’t like he got lost. He knew what he was doing. That’s why he didn’t have a problem when he got his truck stuck to just hunt and come back, although it was quite a walk to where he had to go to. Either way, that was him.”
Richard Atwood, who owns about 350 acres that slope through the woods toward Route 27, said he had given the Babula brothers permission to hunt on his property and to erect tree stands wherever they wanted to.
“Once a year he showed up to hunt. He would check in. Usually the week of Thanksgiving he’d stop by,” Atwood said. “Usually his brother was with him.”
Anette Tindall at Tindall’s Country Store and Dam Diner, the only store in town, said she saw Todd Babula once a year, during hunting season.
“He was nice to us – great customer,” she said. “He enjoyed hunting season. He loved to hunt and fish.”
Steve Babula said he was still waiting for official word Monday on how his brother died.
“I’m not sure if he fell out of a tree or if he had a heart condition. He was healthy,” he said. “There’s nothing yet that they know. We just got him out of the woods last night. He wasn’t feeling well. He set his gun down, took his vest off, like he had sat down. They found him laying down.”
Todd Babula had been hunting by himself. Steve Babula said his plan was to come up this week and join others in a group that hunts together every year during Thanksgiving week.
“He usually comes up alone a lot,” he said. “He doesn’t mind hunting alone.”
Doug Harlow can be contacted at 612-2367 or at:
dharlow@centralmaine.com
Twitter: Doug_Harlow
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