A hiker who fell to his death near Iceberg Lake this weekend was seemingly ill equipped for the high-alpine terrain, said the head of Whistler Search and Rescue (WSAR).
The 27-year-old foreign national was reported missing at around 7 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 16 after he failed to return as planned from a hike close to Rainbow Mountain, northwest of Whistler.
WSAR was activated and crews continued the search into the early hours before efforts were called off around 5:30 a.m. At first light, the search resumed, with poor weather hampering the rescue. Just after noon, WSAR manager Brad Sills said additional crews were about to be called in from the Lower Mainland when a team noticed "a very faint footprint" on the glacier, and followed it to a crevasse where it appears the man fell roughly 75 metres to his death.
"It looks likes the subject exited the glacier where it got too steep and went to the rockface immediately adjacent to it," he added.
Sills noted that the hiker, who was wearing running shoes, seemed to have left the Iceberg Lake trail before climbing up an additional 460 metres through tricky terrain.
"He certainly wasn't equipped to be in that type of terrain," Sills said.
"The prepared trails are for hiking and they're well suited to that. If you leave hiking trails and are going to do any type of scrambling, rock climbing, mountaineering or glacier walking, you need to be prepared both with equipment and experience."
No further details on the hiker are available at this time as police work to identify next of kin.
Search is on for missing Squamish Nation man
The Squamish RCMP is asking the public for help locating a man that has been missing since last week.
Matthew Ohman was last seen by a family member on Friday, Sept. 15 at around 5 p.m. entering a wooded area near the Axen Reserve in Squamish.
The 30-year-old is described as being First Nations, approximately 5-8 (173 centimetres) tall and weighing 170 pounds (77 kilograms), with short dark hair and brown eyes. He was last seen wearing a black baseball cap with a First Nations design on the front, a black sweater with the word "Giants" across the chest, red shorts, black runners, and carrying a red Budweiser cooler bag.
The RCMP has been working closely with Ohman's family, the Squamish Nation and Squamish Search and Rescue since the missing report was filed, according to police.
In an interview with Pique's sister paper, the Squamish Chief, Ohman's common-law partner, Jacelynne Joseph, said it was unusual for the father of two not to be in contact.
"He has got a family that loves him," she said. "We just want him home."
Anyone with information on Ohman's whereabouts is asked to call Squamish RCMP at 604-892-6100 or Sea to Sky Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222-8477.
