TWO teens were left shaken but safe Wednesday after they were plucked from a ravine where a nearly identical rescue took place three weeks ago.
The victims were snowboarding on North Vancouver's Mount Seymour at about midday when they apparently ducked under a boundary rope and descended into a famously dangerous piece of terrain called Suicide Gully.
The pair soon found themselves trapped at the top of a waterfall, unable to climb back up the precipitous slope above them.
Friends of the victims, also on the mountain and worried by their companions' long absence, alerted the Mount Seymour ski patrol. The patrollers passed the call along to members of North Shore Rescue.
The team, in Lynn Canyon Park at the time looking for a missing man, got in touch with the trapped teens briefly by phone and then dispatched a helicopter to the area. The snowboarders were extracted by long line and flown back to safety.
"They were cold, wet and freaked out" but otherwise unharmed, said North Shore Rescue team leader Tim Jones.
A 24-year-old Vancouver Island man
AN alert jogger, who put two and two together when he noticed a ladder under his neighbour's window, is being credited with catching a thief who police say may be responsible for several break-and-enters throughout the Lower Mainland.
Police said a West Vancouver man was out for a run in the 6600-block of Marine Drive around 5 p.m. on Tuesday when he noticed a ladder under his neighbour's window.
The man also noted a suspicious vehicle parked nearby and reported the licence plate number and relevant information to the West Vancouver police.
Officers arrived a short time later and confirmed a break and enter had occurred at the home. They tracked down the vehicle, a 2001 Nissan Maxima, and after a brief investigation arrested the man inside.
Police believe property they recovered in the bust is linked to crimes in other areas of the Lower Mainland.
Paul Smith, 36, of North Vancouver, has been charges with break and enter and breach of recognizance. was extracted from the same gully Jan. 26 when he rode into the area and got stranded on a 40-storey cliff. He also had to be flown out by helicopter.
The incidents illustrate yet again that heading out of bounds is a bad plan, said Jones.
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