An out-of-bounds snowboarder came within metres of his doom Thursday night before being saved by North Shore Rescue.
The volunteer team received a call for help around 6 p.m. after a 37-year-old man ducked the rope and went out of bounds down the west side of Mount Strachan, an area known all too well by North Shore Rescue members for trapping wayward skiers and snowboarders.
Over the phone, Cypress Mountain ski patrol encouraged him to try following his tracks back out.
“I don’t think that worked very well for him because he was already tired by then. He’d grovelled around so long, he probably had lots of tracks everywhere,” Pope said. “He ended up getting further lost and he was stuck.”
North Shore Rescue sent two teams in on foot from their Cypress search and rescue base, taking almost two hours to find him.
“He was exhausted. He wasn’t in the best of shape to start with, and I think this was more than he could handle. He had been out there since 2:30 p.m.,” said Doug Pope, search manager. “He was so close to potential death because he got within about 50 metres of the cliff and waterfall that people die off of routinely. Luckily he stopped and phoned for help when he did.”
A 40-year-old Surrey man died in that spot in February last year.
Pope said the rescue subject believed it was safe, since he’d successfully gone out of bounds in that area before and made it back to the resort’s boundaries.
“I hope he’s learned a lesson. Even if you think you know the area, things can go wrong quickly,” Pope said.
Generally, North Shore Rescue advises people to stay put when they are lost but if you have the ability to follow your tracks back to civilization, that should be the first course of action, Pope added.
