Sicamous man’s body pulled from avalanche slide

SICAMOUS — A snowmobiler that was reported missing early Tuesday morning has been found dead, according to Sicamous RCMP.

Police say the man’s body was recovered from an avalanche slide in the Morton Lake area of the Owlshead Mountain Range following an air and ground search.

Shortly before 2:30 Tuesday morning, the family of a 34-year-old Sicamous man reported him as being overdue from a snowmobile excursion in the area.

The man had last been seen on Sunday afternoon and was expected to have returned by Monday evening from his solo outing.

“The Sicamous RCMP immediately activated the Shuswap Search and Rescue team and at first light the RCMP Air 4 helicopter flew into the area, in efforts to locate any sign of the man, while ground search crews made their way to the specific area,” said Cpl. Dan Moskaluk in a news release.

Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "The Sicamous RCMP immediately activated the Shuswap Search and Rescue team and at first light the RCMP Air 4 helicopter flew into the area, in efforts to locate any sign of the man, while ground search crews made their way to the specific area," said Cpl. Dan Moskaluk in a news release.

“It was known that the man was carrying both a GPS spot beacon device and a transceiver receiver.”

Moskaluk says the air search was short due to being hampered by poor visibility. Crews eventually found a fresh avalanche slide and a single snowmobile track.

“The Sicamous RCMP was able to obtain a pinged location from the GPS device agency which corroborated their findings at the fresh avalanche location near Skinny Ridge by Morton Lake,” said Moskaluk.

Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "The Sicamous RCMP was able to obtain a pinged location from the GPS device agency which corroborated their findings at the fresh avalanche location near Skinny Ridge by Morton Lake," said Moskaluk.

“The ground search crew included Shuswap SAR, family and friends and members of the Eagles Valley Snowmobile club.”

Eclipse Helicopter also flew over the area with a Ministry of Highways Avalanche technician to assess the risk to ground crews.

“Ground searchers were about to be turned around due to the continued avalanche risk, just as some of them had made it onto the slide area and commenced searching for the man,” said Moskaluk.

Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "Ground searchers were about to be turned around due to the continued avalanche risk, just as some of them had made it onto the slide area and commenced searching for the man," said Moskaluk.

“The man was located deceased with the aid of the transceiver receiver that he was equipped with.”

The man’s body was airlifted from the area. The RCMP will continue helping the B.C. Coroners Service with its investigation into the man’s death.