Three candles flickered on Monday afternoon at a quiet ceremony for three Central Albertans who died in an avalanche near Golden, B.C. on Saturday.
About 50 people gathered at the Donalda Ski Hill for a moment of silence and prayer for Andy Gebhardt, his son Jarrett Gebhardt, and Norbert Mueller.
The fathers were 48 and 50, and Jarrett was in his 20s.
Mueller was from the Halkirk area, and the Gebhardts lived outside Donalda.
Golden RCMP say they were buried after two of the snowmobilers triggered the avalanche while high-marking, trying to drive as far up the slope as possible, in the Hope River Mount Gerald area on Saturday at about 5 p.m.
Travis Mueller, Norbert Mueller’s son, survived and was taken to hospital suffering from shock and minor injuries.
Another group of snowmobilers witnessed the slide and tried to save the Albertans, digging them out from beneath the snow.
Duane Albers, of Heisler, said he was planned to go on the trip to Golden.
But when the forecast turned cold for the weekend, he decided he’d better stay home to look after his cows.
Albers talked to Norbert for the last time from Golden, the day of the avalanche.
“I talked that morning with Norbert on his cellphone on his way out, at about 10 a.m.,” said Albers after the brief memorial.
They are going to be missed, he said.
“All we have left are our memories.”
The friends always kept an eye out for each other and used the proper safety equipment while they were snowmobiling in the back country.
But things can happen, like in any sports, he said.
“Things happen. We don’t go out there looking to get hurt. We all want to come home,” Albers said.
Family members went to Golden after they heard about the avalanche.
RCMP and Golden Search and Rescue had to wait until Sunday morning when it was light out to retrieve the bodies.
Rescuers also had to assess the stability of the slope before the recovery.
“We can attribute the rescue of the one person to snowmobilers who observed (the avalanche) and their quick response,” said Golden RCMP Sgt. Troy Durand on Monday.
The fact that everyone was wearing personal transceiver devices helped to quickly determine where the men were buried, he said.
The transceivers, which can transmit and receive a signal, allowed snowmobilers involved in the rescue to turn on their transceivers to pick up signals from the transceivers the men had under the snow to pinpoint their exact location.
RCMP and Golden Search and Rescue were also immediately alerted by GPS devices.
Forrest Hagen, who knows the Mueller family, said people are still in shock.
“You hear about these snowmobile accidents, where there’s three or four people who die in one avalanche and they’re all from one community. You wonder, ‘Are they one of ours?’ It was our turn this time,” Hagen said.
“It’s a tight-knit community. Everyone will rally around the families.”
The ceremony for the men was held at the community’s Family Day event at the local ski hill, with tobogganing and a wiener roast.
“There’s people here in town who have known them all their lives. Chances are, all of them learned to ski when this was operating as a ski hill,” said Donalda Mayor Bruce Gartside.
The ceremony for the men was meant to be low-key. A larger community memorial could be held, depending on the wishes of the families, Gartside said.
And Donalda is ready to lend their support.
“With communities like this, you don’t tend to think in terms of town limits. The community extends far beyond the town.”
Earlier in the day, workers at Luscar Ltd.’s Paint Earth coal mine stood silently before their shift began as a manager told them about their colleagues. The dead men all worked together as equipment operators in the open-pit strip mine.
“Out at the mine here it is tough. You lose three guys off of one crew, it is a big blow,” Ross Elsasser said from the mine near Forestburg. “They were great guys. They did what they loved doing.”
The Hope Creek area of eastern B.C. is described as unmaintained and only for advanced sledders. It has a high risk for avalanches, but falls outside the areas covered by national warnings. Neither Parks Canada nor the Canadian Avalanche Centre post conditions bulletins for a large parcel of backcountry near the Alberta boundary, including Mount Gerald where the slide occurred.
Elsasser said he turned down an invitation to join the sledding trip because he felt he didn’t have enough experience.
“I’m a green sledder. That is what I told Andy (Gebhardt) when he phoned me. I said I have never been out there.”
Former Donalda mayor Terry Nordahl said the men all loved to snowmobile because they were too busy in the summer farming to take a holiday.
She said relatives were heading home Monday after travelling to B.C. to identify the bodies.
“Right now everyone is just standing around dumbfounded,” Nordahl said.
“It is just such a tragedy. Brenda (Gebhardt) loses both her husband and her son in one swoop and Lisa (Mueller) loses her husband and nearly loses her son. Our hearts just bleed for them.”
szielinski@www.reddeeradvocate.com
— with files from the Canadian Press