A young Enderby man is lucky to have survived a 1,600-foot fall off an Alberta mountain while skiing.
The incident happened at Goat’s Eye Mountain in Banff National Park outside the ski boundary at Sunshine Village near Banff, at around 12:30 p.m. local time Friday, March 27.
According to Grant Statham, visitor safety specialist with Parks Canada for Banff, Yoho and Kootenay National Parks, skiers can ride the Goat’s Eye lift at Sunshine where it’s common, he said, for people to hike above the chair lift to access runs called the South Side Chutes.
If a skier hikes a bit further than most people go, said Statham, they end up at the edge of a huge cliff where a rope is in place to stop skiers from going any further.
“This person took their skis off and proceeded to cross through the rope and walked out to a lip of a cornice (an overhang of snow or ice that accumulates along the crest of the leeward side of mountain ridges) and the cornice broke,” said Statham.
The unidentified Enderby man is 18-years-old.
“They fell approximately 500 metres (1,600 feet), a terrible fall,” said Statham. “It’s amazing that they survived this. That’s the remarkable part about this is that they lived.”
Unconfirmed reports have the injured man skiing with his younger brother and his father.
The companions walked to where the young man had been, found his skis there, and saw his footprints heading out to the big piece of snow that collapsed.
“They (injured skier) fell, they went over a large cliff, bounced down a big gulley then got spat out the bottom and they ended up on a snow slope,” said Statham.
“I think what saved this guy, and this has happened before in history, it’s not uncommon people taking these huge falls, is that he was cushioned by all the snow that fell with him and that helped him survive this thing.”
It’s believed one of the companions phoned in the distress call, and the injured skier alerted rescuers that he was alive.
“We responded to the call quickly,” said Statham. “We flew over the area and the initial impression on something like this is the person is not going to be alive.
“We located the person on the surface of the snow and they waved at us. We’re like, ‘Holy smokes, they’re alive.’”
Crews did a quick rescue as the spot where the injured skier ended up was still in a hazardous area with more cornices hanging over.
The man was rescued with a helicopter long line.
He was taken by ambulance to Banff’s Mineral Springs Hospital with a badly broken leg and broken back. He was then transferred to Calgary’s Foothills Hospital.
It is believed the skier was wearing a helmet.
His condition was unknown as of press time Tuesday.
Statham said nobody should ever walk out on to snow to look over the edge of a cliff.
