8 Sparwood snowmobilers missing after avalanches

[KootenayFlamesFan]

Rusnak and Adams were able to free Drake before the next avalanche hit.

"That's when we had to make our gut-wrenching decision to leave our eight friends and start walking off the mountain," said Adams, emotion choking his words.

"It's one of those quick decisions you've got to make," he said. "I replay it in my head all the time.

"I'm truly sorry to the families that we couldn't find them."

http://www.theprovince.com/Avalanche...888/story.html


Feel brutal for the guy. He'll replay it in his head for the rest of his life.

[Dion]

Victim 'knew' deadly risks - Snowmobiler's widow recalls foreboding

Warren Rothel always had a sense the extreme snowmobiling he craved would one day be his demise, his wife said Wednesday.

From the time Rothel's dad taught him to ride his first machine -- a Kitty Cat -- when he was four years old, his passion for the sport only grew.

As he dropped tens of thousands of dollars on souped-up machines over the years, a sense of foreboding lingered in the back of his mind, said Erin Rothel.

"He knew. He's the type that knew it was inevitable," she said. "He didn't plan on it so soon."

Rothel had lived through three avalanches in the past while snowmobiling, and was well aware of the risks, Erin Rothel said.

He was saved from the snow near Alexander, B. C., after an avalanche several years ago. Just his hand was poking out from the snow before he was pulled out, Erin said.

"He just slid. He was unconscious when they got him," she said. "He just said it's not something you ever want to experience, suffocating, like you're in a block of sand."

"He said sometimes it's better to be the one who's dead than a survivor."

http://www.calgaryherald.com/Victim+...718/story.html