North Shore Rescue answers three calls for help in less than 12 hours

North Shore Rescue has responded to three calls for assistance in less than 12 hours, adding to what’s been an unfortunately busy season for the search and rescue group.

Although all three rescue operations were successful, team leader Mike Danks said he was concerned with the high volume of callouts the group has answered so far this year.

“We’re sitting at 95 calls. That’s a pretty high number for us for August. We’re getting rocked here,” said Danks.

The emergency reports came flooding in yesterday around 5:30 p.m., when the rescue group was called out to just north of St. Marks Summit in Cypress Provincial Park after a woman fell while hiking and sustained a head injury, according to Danks.

“That call was a bit more of an urgent medical rescue. We had a physician go in, do the assessment, they ended up doing a longline to get that subject brought back out,” he said.

Around 8:30 p.m. last night, North Shore Rescue was contacted again after three male hikers, all in their 30s, got lost on the challenging Coliseum Mountain route that passes through Lynn Headwaters Regional Park.

The three hikers were in OK condition, but weren’t prepared for the trek out once it got dark out.

“No jackets, just basically in a t-shirt, no light source, no food, no water,” said Danks.

Because the spot was so remote, the trio was told to hunker down for the night. At dawn, North Shore Rescue took off in a helicopter and the group was found safely on the trail and brought out, he said.

An additional call came at 1:30 a.m. this morning, when a woman reached out to say that her partner was late returning from an excursion on Mount Seymour where he had attempted to hike to Elsay Lake.

The rescue group started to put a crew together in the Seymour area to go look for the solo hiker in his 30s, but ended up spotting him to the east of Tim Jones Peak, at which point the individual managed to hike out the rest of the way on his own as the sun rose.

“A lot of the calls that we’ve had lately have been for people that are unprepared,” said Danks, who recommended hikers carry the 10 essential items, such as a flashlight, extra clothing, and a whistle, with them whenever they head outdoors.

North Shore Rescue’s busiest year ever was in 2018, when the group responded to 144 calls.

“We’re well on our way to beating that right now,” said Danks.