BANFF – When an emergency call came in of a potential mass casualty incident from a massive rockfall at Bow Glacier Falls, local hospitals were put on standby and up to 100 emergency services personnel descended on the area.
The deadly rockfall at the popular waterfall near Bow Lake in Banff National Park on Thursday (June 19) claimed the lives of two hikers, seriously injured three others and led to evacuation of about 13 other people who had minor injuries or were remarkably unhurt.
Following an exhaustive two-day multi-agency operation, Parks Canada rescuers wrapped up the search Friday after there were no other reports of missing people from loved ones and all vehicles at the parking lot have been accounted for.
“We don't have any other reason to believe that there’s anybody else buried there,” said Lisa Paulson, a visitor safety specialist with Banff National Park.
Witnesses to the disaster that struck about 12:40 p.m. reported the rock slide was about 50 metres wide and 20 metres deep and approximately the “size of an apartment building.”
“I just heard a crack and all of a sudden just this whole piece of the wall came down,” said Canmore’s Niclas Brundell, who ran for his life with his wife.
"It looked just like a slab avalanche and it fell off the mountain and started crumbling and hitting the ground.”
When the alarm was raised at about 1 p.m. via satellite communication device, elite mountain rescue team specialists from Banff and Jasper national parks responded with RCMP and support from Lake Louise Fire Department and an advanced care Banff EMS paramedic.
The first victim was confirmed dead shortly after rescuers arrived at 2 p.m., and a second deceased person buried beneath the vastly spread rubble was not detected by rescuers until later in the day.
Parks Canada’s dog handler Logan Bennett and his search and rescue dog Leroy picked up the scent of the second dead person; however, due to instability and continued hazard, the body could not be safely recovered that evening.
An aerial search continued until darkness fell and national park wardens and RCMP remained on site overnight for security.
“We were concerned about the residual risk,” said Paulson.
“We wanted to have a geotechnical engineer assessment and it was getting late in the day and we didn’t want to expose people to that risk without further preparation.”
The next morning at 5 a.m., Canada Task Force Two – a national disaster response team – began infrared drone flights through their partners in the Calgary Police Service followed by more investigation with a thermal imaging camera.
“Teams conducted a 360-degree assessment in areas of interest and found no indication of human presence,” said François Masse, superintendent of Lake Louise, Yoho and Kootenay field unit.
At 6 a.m., a Canada Task Force One geotechnical engineer conducted a slope stability assessment, which allowed visitor safety specialists to recover the remaining deceased individual from the site prior to expected snowfall.
“Our team went in with the help of the Lake Louise Fire Department and some of their equipment,” said Paulson.
“It wasn’t an easy retrieval with moving the debris and we removed the last person.”
Though confident there were no other people unaccounted for based on an extensive and exhaustive investigation, including interviews of people in the area, the search continued “out of an abundance of caution” including a full RECCO search of the area.
RECCO reflectors – lightweight passive transponders – are integrated into jackets, pants, helmets, backpacks, back protectors, boots, transceivers, and harnesses – but no one else was detected beneath the rock debris.
“Our observations with all the searching tools that we had, the drone imaging, the thermal imaging, the RECCO, the Parks Canada dog team, and the interviews we did, let us wind down the search effort,” said Paulson.
“We had nobody reported missing and everybody was accounted for within the parking lot.”
In all, an estimated 100 personnel responded to the tragic rockfall, including visitor safety specialists from Banff and Jasper national parks, RCMP, Kananaskis Mountain Rescue, Banff and Lake Louise fire departments, STARS Air Ambulance, Alpine Helicopters, Alberta Health Services EMS, Banff EMS and other agencies.
“It was just this big job of getting all the resources moving, plus an incident command set up starting to reach out to Canada Task Force team and supporting agencies that can assist,” said Paulson.
Once arriving at the chaotic scene, she said the first focus was helping people needing care.
As rescuers flew in with Alpine Helicopters, Paulson said they could see from the air that there were “four individuals on the debris and there were bystanders caring for them.”
“Nobody else required ambulance or EMS care other than the two very seriously injured and the one not as serious, but still needed ground transport by ambulance, and then we had the one that was sadly deceased,” she said.
Paulson said the Kananaskis Mountain Rescue team with Alpine Helicopters was able to fly the most seriously injured patients via a long line to the waiting STARS helicopters – one that was able to land at the site and the other that landed near Bow Lake.
“After caring for the patients and evacuating the bystanders by helicopter, our attention turned to searching,” she said.
Rockfall result of natural process
Bow Glacier Falls, located west of Bow Lake on the Icefields Parkway is about 37 kms north of Lake Louise.
Masse said geotechnical assessments indicate that this tragic rockfall was the result of a natural process in mountain areas.
“Sadly, this extremely rare event appears to have been neither preventable nor predictable,” he said.
“The scope and size of this rock fall is extremely rare for the mountain environment.” While the spur trail to Bow Hut remains open, the area around Bow Glacier Falls is still closed.
Masse said Parks Canada will take time to consider all options before making decisions related to the reopening of the area.
“The area around Bow Glacier Falls is currently closed and will remain closed for the foreseeable future because we understand that there's remaining instability in the rock face there,” he said.
“There's going to be future assessments before we make a decision on reopening that area.”
One of the dead hikers has been identified as Jutta Hinrichs of Calgary, a retired educator from the University of Alberta.
The identity of the other victim has not been released by RCMP.
“At this time the notification of next of kin has not been done so we will not be sharing that,” said Cpl. Gina Slaney, public information officer with Alberta RCMP Media Group. “However, once we can verify that that is done and family have been notified, we would certainly send out an update.”
Masse said Parks Canada and RCMP extended their deepest condolences to the families and friends of the two individuals who lost their lives.
“Our thoughts also remain with those in hospital and we hope for their full recovery,” he said.
