Squamish Search and Rescue (SSR) says it was “all hands on deck” Monday evening, helping an elderly man out of the woods after he injured himself on the Watersprite Trail.
In a video posted to social media, a team of 22 SSR ground crew volunteers can be seen lifting the man on a wheeled stretcher over five kilometres of rocks, roots, logs, and water crossings.
SSR Manager Cindy Welsh tells 1130 NewsRadio that they had sent a helicopter to fly over but found there was “too much cloud cover” to make an aerial rescue.
“Before helicopters were available, this is how rescues were done,” said the SSR social media post.
Welsh says the man fell three times on the trail before calling for help. He and his hiking partner had reportedly turned around after the first two falls, but Welsh says he “cracked his head and opened up a laceration” on the third.
“He thought he could do more of the trail than he could actually do so he was overtired and couldn’t get out any further. So we responded to get to him really quickly, to assess him, to make sure he was doing okay, stabilized him, and then stretcher carried him out,” said Welsh.
Welsh says the trail runs over “very complex terrain” on the way to Watersprite Lake.
“Where the team picked up with the person who needed help, it was quite a number of switchbacks, very slippery rocks, roots, stream crossings, very narrow crossings with a stretcher carry with multiple people, so very treacherous.”
She added that the trail has become more popular, and she’s found SSR making more rescues along it in recent years.
Welsh says after an approximately three-hour hike out, SSR handed the man off to paramedics and believes he is now being treated in hospital.
She says she’s proud to work with the big team of SSR members who answered the call.
“All these people gave up their personal time to come out as volunteers for nine hours and walk through the woods … in the wet and the complex terrain to help somebody out that they don’t even know.”
—With files from Raynaldo Suarez