One dead in B.C. avalanche

GOLDEN, B.C. - A Golden, B.C., man has become the 11th person to die in an avalanche in the Canadian West this winter.

Two of his companions, however, survived the backcountry slide, which came down around 2 p.m. local time on Wednesday near Golden, about 260 kilometres west of Calgary.

Dead is Peter Bowle-Evans, 61. Two other men, also from Golden - Hugh Southee, 26, and Kyle Chartrand, 29 - survived.

RCMP Cpl. Barry Kennedy said the three were backcountry skiing about five kilometres from the top of Kicking Horse ski resort, in an out-of-bounds area called Canyon Creek.

Bowle-Evans and Southee were caught in the avalanche and Chartrand managed to escape it. Chartrand then rescued Southee and together they found and dug out Bowle-Evans, a former president of the B.C. heli-gliding association.

"They performed CPR on him for about half an hour," said Kennedy, but Bowle-Evans died.

Officials said it took the two men about 10 hours to walk out of the backcountry area.

Bowle-Evans's body was recovered overnight.

It is the 11th death in an avalanche in Western Canada this winter.

John Kelly, of the Canadian Avalanche Centre, said Canada is on its way toward an exceptional number of avalanche-related deaths.

"And the worst is yet to come in terms of the months with the highest average number of avalanche accidents, and that's January, February and March," he added.

Edmonton Journal