SALT LAKE CITY - A family of four was safely rescued from the banks of a southern Utah river over the weekend, two days after their boats capsized after hitting high water and boulders, Utah authorities said Monday.

A mother, father and two teenage girls were rescued from the Escalante River on Sunday when a Utah Department of Public Safety helicopter searching for a missing kayaker spotted the family desperately waving their arms, department spokeswoman Marissa Cote said.

Cote said the family had been stranded since Friday, but she did not have details about how they survived, including whether they had food or shelter. The parents and the daughters, ages 13 and 17, did not need medical attention, she said.

Cote and the Garfield County Sheriff's Office, which assisted in the rescue, did not have details Monday about the family, including their names, whether they live in Utah and information about their trip on the river, which winds through rugged canyons.

The missing kayaker that prompted the original search was later found safe and had left the river on his own, Cote said.

The Department of Public Safety planned to hold a news conference later Monday offering more details.

When the rescuers spotted the family, they landed their helicopter nearby and first flew the mother and daughters out of the canyon to an airport in the town of Escalante, authorities said. The helicopter then returned for the father, who was waiting with a sheriff's deputy and a state public safety officer.

Garfield County Sheriff James "Danny" Perkins, speaking to The Associated Press in a telephone call from his office in the town of Panguitch, said Monday that he was still missing key details about the rescue because he had not yet had a chance to speak with the deputy who was involved. That deputy is based at a rural outpost 100 miles away in the town of Boulder, where cellphone service can be spotty, Perkins said.

Perkins did not have details about the family's ordeal. But he said they were "desperate enough though this experience, they were concerned enough to have a prayer. And lo and behold, a state helicopter appears."

The Escalante River, running through unforgiving terrain on the massive, 3,000-square mile Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, is normally running high this time of year as melting snow creates runoff, Perkins said. But a Friday storm walloped the area and likely had river levels running even higher over the weekend, the sheriff said.

Monica Trapakgan, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Salt Lake City, did not have specific precipitation reports for areas near the monument. But she said storms over southern Utah most of Friday brought moisture to the area.

A message left with a spokesman for the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument was not returned.

News from © The Associated Press, 2017