MEAN SEASON IN CANADA’S PARKS
Parks Canada rescue staff is kept busy at this time every year as warm weather brings out the crowds while also creating dangerous conditions. The good news is that, despite a couple of incredible falls, no one has died in the incidents, writes Colette De
Cornice falls, icy pathways and fallen rocks have all led to rescues in the mountain parks — some of the many calls that have kept parks crews busy in the past month. In most cases, it has simply led to cold, lost and scared visitors. But, in two cases, it’s remarkable the injuries weren’t worse after falls between 150 and 500 metres.
“It’s spring,” said Grant Statham, visitor safety specialist with Banff , Yoho and Kootenay national parks. “In the last week to 10 days, there’s been a lot going on. We had four calls on Sunday.”
Statham described some of the latest rescues in an interview with the Calgary Herald.
WAPTA ICEFIELD
In the most serious call on Sunday, Parks Canada dispatch received a message from a personal locator beacon set off near the Balfour High Col on the Wapta Icefi eld at about 1: 30 p. m.
Statham said a crew tried to get to the area but whiteout conditions meant they couldn’t get in.
On Monday, they were able to fl y a three- person team to the bottom of one of the glaciers and approach the Scott Duncan hut on skis. They found two people from a group of 10, part of a recreational ski touring group from across the United States.
The incident happened Monday afternoon.
“They had been travelling through the Balfour High Col in a terrible whiteout so they couldn’t see anything,” Statham said. “They made it up the glacier, went through the High Col and then took the rope off and proceeded to head across the glacier to the Scott Duncan hut. They got slightly off their line, and the person out front skied right off the end of a cornice and fell.”
The man, believed to be in his mid- 30s, dropped about 150 metres.
Statham said the man lost most of his equipment and bounced through several rock bands, but he was able to stop himself on the 50- degree slope.
“He was relatively uninjured after the fall,” he said, noting it was a strong group of skiers. “Now he’s down in this awful place, stuck down there. It’s snowy and windy and a whiteout and they’re at 2,800, almost 3,000 metres on the Wapta Icefi eld.”
They started a self- rescue and sent another member of the group over the cornice on a rope. It collapsed for a second time.
“So now we have two people hanging on the other side of the cornice — one on a rope and one not,” he said. “Through a collective eff ort of their group, over a number of hours, they were able to get a rope down to this guy. Eventually, at the end of the day, everybody got their way up to the glacier ... and they worked their way up to the Scott Duncan hut into the night.”
Most of the group made their way down, but two men were still at the hut when the Parks Canada rescue team arrived.
“We spent a couple of hours at the hut waiting for the weather to clear,” said Statham, noting they had a team member bring some skis up and walked the pair out through the whiteout. “Then we evacuated them by helicopter.”
Statham said there’s a big lesson to be learned: “When you are on a glacier, wear a rope.”
JOHNSTON CANYON
Crews were called to Johnston Canyon twice on Sunday for people who had slipped on the ice, either cracking their head or breaking their arm.
“The trails are icy, it’s spring and everything is melting and then freezing,” said Statham. “Our advice to people is if you are going to go hiking on some of these trails, bring some cleats.
“Those seem to be a pretty critical tool these days for getting around the valley bottom.”
LAKE LOUISE
In another rescue on Sunday, a group of tourists was hiking at the back of Lake Louise.
“They scrambled up just off the trail into the rocks, not far off the trail at all,” Statham said. “It was a warm, spring day and it had been raining recently and a big rock came whistling down the gully and broke this woman’s leg quite badly.
“So, again, another spring thing. Rocks are starting to fall down and people are in gullies.”
SULPHUR MOUNTAIN
In the past three weeks, there have been three rescues on Sulphur Mountain as people hike up the trail under the gondola.
“It’s super- icy, so it’s really hard for people to get traction in their regular footwear,” said Statham. “So a lot of people are freelancing it, they are heading into the forest to see if they can fi nd a diff erent way up there where they can get better traction.
“We’ve had three instances of people who did that and then got lost and drawn into gullies on either side.”
GOAT’S EYE
Last Friday, in the most serious incident of all, a young man broke his arm and his back when he fell off a cornice on Goat’s Eye Mountain — just outside the boundary of Sunshine ski resort.
The man went up to the ski hill, took the lift up to Goat’s Eye and hiked in an out- of- bounds area.
“He wanted to look over the edge,” said Statham. “He took his skis off , ducked the rope and walked right out on to a lip of a cornice and it collapsed. He fell 500 metres. He took a huge fall.
“It’s amazing, amazing that he survived. He fell about 150 metres free fall in the air, then he rattled down this gully and got spat out the bottom on a big snow slope.”
Statham said it’s likely the snow from the cornice cushioned his fall.
As rescuers fl ew over the area in the helicopter, they saw the young man move.
“He just waved his arm,” Statham said. “Everybody took a deep breath and said, ‘ Wow, awesome.’”
They went in with a rescuer on a long line, plucked the young man off the slope and slung him out.
“We weren’t in there for very long,” Statham explained. “It was a quick rescue. It’s not a place where we’d want to insert a lot of people.”
Statham said the man was very lucky to survive.
“He’s got a story to tell for his life,” he said, noting it’s important people pay attention to boundary ropes and never walk to the edge of a cliff in winter to look over the edge. “Cornice accidents happen all of the time.”