Randy Cyril Day, 70: Adventurer, nature-lover, veteran; beloved husband, father and brother

CEDAR CITY, UTAH – Randy Cyril Day, born on No­vem­ber 25, 1953, in New­port, VT, died peace­fully on Jan­u­ary 2 af­ter a brief ill­ness with can­cer. He was the beloved son of Cyril Day and Eve­lyn Mon­fette Day. Randy’s jour­ney through life was marked by a pro­found pas­sion for gad­gets and tech­nol­ogy, a love that held true from his high school days through his re­tire­ment.

Dur­ing his time in high school Randy show­cased his tech­no­log­i­cal prowess by run­ning an un­der­ground ra­dio sta­tion from his fam­i­ly’s barn. His fas­ci­na­tion with as­tro pho­tog­ra­phy also took root dur­ing these early years. Later in life, Randy’s ex­per­tise in tech­nol­ogy led him to a ful­fill­ing ca­reer at BAE Sys­tems in Merrimack, where he worked with lasers to sup­port mil­i­tary de­fense con­tracts un­til his well-de­served re­tire­ment.

Randy’s ad­ven­tur­ous spirit took him around the globe. He joined the United States Air Force right out of high school, serv­ing in south­east Asia and Eu­rope. His time in Ger­many, de­spite a chal­leng­ing en­counter with a ter­ror­ist at­tack that re­quired med­ical at­ten­tion, left an in­deli­ble mark on him. Randy also con­tributed to the Thun­der Birds while on a spe­cial as­sign­ment dur­ing his ser­vice.

His ca­reer as a de­fense con­trac­tor with GE took him to Saudi Ara­bia and Thai­land, where he met his wife, Sunta­ree. Both work and play across the United States even­tu­ally led Randy to set­tle in Utah, near Zion Na­tional Park. It was here that he most ap­pre­ci­ated the beauty of na­ture dur­ing his all-too-short re­tire­ment.

Randy will be fondly re­mem­bered for his unique ob­ses­sions, in­clud­ing mince­meat pie, Devil Dogs, maple candy, and his moth­er’s home­made whoopie pies. These culi­nary de­lights were among the many ways he ex­pressed his zest for life.

He is sur­vived by his lov­ing wife, Sunta­ree Day, of Utah; daugh­ter Heather Day, cur­rently re­sid­ing in Texas; and son, Tim­o­thy Day and his wife, Ash­ley, of New Hamp­shire. Randy is also sur­vived by his sib­lings: brother Terry Day and sis­ter Kim Collins, both of Ver­mont; sis­ter Cheryl Sar­gent of New Hamp­shire; and brother Robin Day of Florida. He leaves be­hind nu­mer­ous nieces, nephews, grand­nieces, and grand­nephews.

Randy was pre­de­ceased by his par­ents, Cyril and Eve­lyn Day, of Ver­mont.

A cel­e­bra­tion of Randy’s re­mark­able life is be­ing planned for April 22 at Zion park in Zion Na­tional Park, a place that held a spe­cial mean­ing for him. In hon­or­ing his mem­ory, let all re­mem­ber the joy he brought to many lives and the legacy of love and ad­ven­ture he leaves be­hind.

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