BILLINGS, Mont. - Karen Frauson was one of the first park rangers to respond to word of a plane crash on a lonely sagebrush flat in Wyoming's Grand Teton National Park last month. A short time later, she also had the grim task of informing the pilot's family that he had died.

But breaking the news of accidents, like this one that killed Wal-Mart heir John Walton, and helping families cope with the sudden reality of the loss is part of what Frauson does as one of the National Park Service's specially trained family liaison officers.

Their skills have been in high demand in recent weeks as a series of fatal accidents and extended searches in national parks have attracted distraught families, some from hundreds of miles away, seeking information - or the chance for a final goodbye.

Because many visitors to national parks are from other states or countries, family members often find themselves without their usual support systems, such as close friends or their minister. Family liaisons help provide some of that support.

The liaisons help families book flights and hotel rooms, deal with coroners and serve as a go-between with investigators. In some cases, they just sit and listen.

"Every incident is so different," said Frauson, who juggles her full-time duties as a district ranger with being a family liaison. "There's definitely no cookie-cutter approach to these things."

When tragedy strikes in a national park - a death, disappearance or serious injury - one person is generally chosen to help the family. Only about 30 rangers and others throughout the Park Service are, like Frauson, formally trained in family outreach, said Pam McMillan, coordinator of the agency program that includes liaison officers. Lack of money has stalled efforts to train more.

"If you have had no training at all, it can be a pretty precarious position," McMillan said from her office in California. "It's a very difficult role to play when you're learning it on the job."

The job of notifying families and helping them through grief is still difficult for Daryl Miller, who has worked at Alaska's Denali National Park and Preserve for 14 years. During the Vietnam war, he escorted the remains of dead soldiers home to their families.

"It doesn't get any easier because you've done two or three or 20," the ranger said. "It's always hard, always unbelievable, always difficult. And what gets you through is knowing it's difficult for them and trying to do the best you can to get them through that."

One case that stands out for Miller was in 1994, when a man in North Carolina who was told by police to call Denali. It was the first time Miller had to break news of a death to someone.

"What do you tell a father? Your son was killed? He was buried in an avalanche?" Miller said. "That was a shock, and he got through it better than I."

Ralph Bell, a sign-maker at Washington's Mount Rainier National Park, is careful not to bring his work home with him, remaining as detached as possible at the end of the day. He chalks this up, in part, to his days as a police officer.

Bell said he's seen so many traumatic accidents, including bodies badly mangled after falling on the mountain, that he's not really affected by them anymore. "I guess the surprise is, sometimes, dealing with the family's reaction."

It's never the same, he said. Some want to be near where their loved ones died; others don't. Some refuse his warning about the condition of a body and want to see it; others heed his advice.

"People want information. No beating around the bush. Just the truth," he said. "And how you present it is key."

JeNae Lay, whose nephew disappeared after falling into a river in Yellowstone National Park on June 24, called park officials who've kept the family informed on the search "amazing, kind and caring and professional."

Luke Sanburg, a 13-year-old Boy Scout from Helena, Mont., is presumed drowned. The search for his body was one of three going on in the park.

Park representatives have visited the church where members of Luke's extended family and volunteers have gathered, she said, and have been open about how the other searches are affecting the one for Luke.

For Frauson, the hardest cases to handle involve children. For Glen Anderson, the cases that especially stand out involve fellow Park Service workers killed in the line of duty. Helping families understand the sacrifices made by their loved ones is extremely rewarding, but can be emotionally taxing, he said.

Anderson, a law enforcement specialist and court officer at Nevada's Lake Mead National Recreation Area, stays in touch with some of the families long after the funeral. That includes the mother of a Lake Mead firefighter killed nearly five years ago in a helicopter crash, and the family of a slain ranger.

"How are you not going to be connected to those people?" he asked. "You're dealing with the highest emotions in life."

Family liaisons are not professional counselors, and they say they try to draw boundaries with those they serve - careful not to get too emotionally involved or become a substitute for the lost loved one. If it gets to be too much, liaisons can pull back and let someone else take the case. In small communities, like Jackson, Wyo., and nearby Grand Teton National Park, it's not unusual for some employees to know a climber who is killed.

National peer counseling teams often are used after large scale or traumatic events to help Park Service employees talk through their experience.

McMillan said the program has operated without funding, with the costs of her teams paid by the parks that request their help. She'd like that to change, and figures $200,000 would help train new liaisons and peer counselors. But she said funding is unlikely and worries about the program's future. Retirement looms within the next decade for many of her trained liaisons.

"All of this will go out in that group," she said.

But for now, their work continues, with liaisons, like Anderson, committed to filling roles many of their colleagues can't handle.

"It's about a helping a human being through a difficult time, and there's no greater reward than helping another person," he said.