The search for Grant Gardner , the Minnesota hiker who went missing on Aug. 1 in Wyoming's Bighorn Mountains, has been suspended.

Big Horn County Sheriff Ken Blackburn made the announcement on Wednesday, calling the decision made jointly with Gardner's family "heartbreaking and difficult."

"Our teams have exhausted all resources and personnel over the last 20 days," Blackburn wrote in a statement. "With weather conditions and other factors updated in our search models, we have to face the reality that the most optimistic survival odds have run out."

Blackburn said search teams will rest before pivoting to a recovery mission, but there are "many citizen volunteers and outdoors people" still looking for Gardner, a husband and father of two from Lakeville.

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