Deadly snowslide close to being Canada's worst avalanche ever

Luck and a quick response prevented last week's avalanche in eastern British Columbia from being the deadliest in Canadian history, according to a preliminary report released Friday by the Canadian Avalanche Centre.

Two Alberta residents were killed March 13 and dozens more were injured when a powerful avalanche swept down Revelstoke's Boulder Mountain, as hundreds of people gathered for the Big Iron Shoot-Out — an annual extreme snowmobiling event.

Paramedics and search-and-rescue workers were under the initial impression that 200 people were buried under up to five metres of snow, said avalanche centre spokeswoman Mary Clayton.

"As we were preparing ourselves and getting ready . . . that's what we were talking about — this could be the worst ever," she said. "But it wasn't. It was incredibly lucky."

Witnesses said the avalanche was triggered by a snowmobiler "high-marking" as part of a competition between riders on the souped-up machines to see who could drive the farthest up the mountain — a theory that the report corroborates, although it notes that "some of what we have been told is unsubstantiated."

Survivors told harrowing stories of being swept up by the falling snow as others described the chaos and panic as they searched for their friends.

Clayton said some of the people were not using transponders, a radio device used to find buried avalanche victims quickly.

"We're lucky those people weren't buried more deeply. Some of the quotes I hear (were) from victims saying, 'I was spit out to the side,' or 'I ended up on top,' " she said. "That's lucky."

As a ski and snowmobiling destination, Revelstoke — about 400 kilometres west of Calgary — is equipped to deal with such a large-scale avalanche rescue operation, said Clayton. "Had it happened somewhere farther away, or not where that kind of activity is normal, that would have been a lot different."

The March 13 slide was so powerful it "scrambled the (snow) machines and wrapped them around each other," according to one eyewitness. Witnesses said they heard people screaming as they frantically searched the wreckage of snowmobiles littered in the snow.

"You could see people's arms, legs and heads sticking out of the snow," said Calgarian Dewinton Blair, who was at the mountain with his brother and uncle. "They were yelling for help and trying to get out. There were a lot of broken legs, arms and wrists."

As the chaos subsided, survivors organized a line and worked methodically to find missing people.

Many have been calling for criminal charges against organizers of the snowmobiling event after Shay Snortland and Kurtis Reynolds, both 33, were killed in the slide.

"We, ironically, just commemorated the centennial of (Canada's deadliest avalanche) earlier this month," said Clayton.

On March 10, 1910, an avalanche crashed down on workers building the Canadian Pacific Railway line through the Rogers Pass in the Rocky Mountains, killing 58.

Meanwhile, the Canadian Avalanche Centre is calling on the federal and provincial governments for more funding, saying an increase in snowmobile accidents and deaths has forced the centre into deficit two years in a row.

Clayton said improved snowmobile technology is to blame.

"A few years ago you had to be a very skilled rider to get up the mountain. Now anyone can get up into highly complex terrain," she said.

The centre receives about $800,000 a year in funding — just over half from government. Clayton said the centre could use four times that amount.

She said the centre was praised by politicians as "world-class" after the avalanche rescue.

"Unfortunately, our funding is anything but world-class," she said.