Stanislav “Stas” Volo reached the top of a rugged mountain route in British Columbia with a working phone and a plan to be back before the gondola closed.

Then the phone died.

What happened next turned one wrong sound into five freezing nights, a desperate family search and a survival story that ended with an injured father of two walking out under his own power.

Today in Canada reported that Volo, 43, had taken the Sea-to-Sky Gondola south of Squamish on Sunday, August 30, intending to hike the Mount Habrich Loop. Rescuers described the route as technical, exposed alpine terrain.

When Volo could not find his way back down, he began circling through country where one bad turn could separate him from the marked route. With only about four hours left before the gondola stopped running, panic started to set in and he felt pressure to choose a direction quickly.

Then he heard something that sounded like highway traffic.

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Volo followed the noise, believing it would lead him toward safety. It was actually pipeline construction in the opposite direction, and the decision carried him deeper into unforgiving terrain.

While descending, he fell into a drainage and injured his heel and wrist. He could no longer climb back the way he had come, so he made the only choice he believed was left: keep moving down, slowly and carefully.

Several cold nights were spent in a small cave near a waterfall. The spot gave him some shelter and kept him close to fresh water while his injured foot recovered enough to bear weight.

He rationed the few gummy candies he had and ate a sweet pink wildflower when hunger took over. The woods offered no easy path, no working phone and no guarantee that the next descent would bring him closer to another person.

Still, he refused to stay put until his strength was gone.

The father of two later said he had learned hard lessons about wilderness survival and hoped that telling the story would keep somebody else from repeating his mistakes.

CityNews Vancouver reported that an enormous multi-agency search had been unfolding around him. Volunteers worked through the day and into the early morning while drones, helicopters, police dogs and teams from across the region combed the mountains.

There had been one agonizing sign of life. On Tuesday, Volo got a brief 911 call through, but the connection was garbled and dropped before rescuers could learn exactly where he was.

The call at least confirmed that he was alive. For his family, those few seconds became something to hold onto while the search stretched across another day, then another.

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Volo eventually reached a river and then the Indian Arm Forest Service Road after making his way down the steep back side of the mountain. There he encountered a construction worker, who connected him with search crews already operating in the area.

He had bruises, a black eye and injuries to his foot and wrist, but he was standing. After five nights in the mountains, he had quite literally walked himself back into the world.

The reunion overwhelmed everybody. Volo said tears ran down his face when he saw people again—and the people searching for him cried too.

Squamish RCMP said Volo had last been seen leaving the gondola at 11:33 a.m. that Sunday, wearing a black T-shirt, black shorts and running shoes, with only a small backpack and a long-sleeved shirt packed inside. Those details show just how little margin for error he had when the weather turned and daylight vanished.

The search drew help from Squamish Search and Rescue, police dog services, the RCMP emergency response and air-services units, the Sea-to-Sky Gondola team and numerous neighboring rescue organizations. Search manager Tyler Duncan later called Volo’s survival remarkable and described the operation as one of the most involved searches of his 15-year career.

There are obvious lessons here about backup navigation, emergency batteries, warm layers and telling somebody exactly where you are going. Volo himself acknowledged that technology sometimes fails and said the ordeal could happen to anyone.

But the detail that sticks is simpler.

Cold, hurt and pointed the wrong way, he kept solving the next problem in front of him: find water, find shelter, rest the foot, move downhill, reach the river, follow the road.

Five nights later, that stubborn chain of small decisions brought him home.

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This is a Guest Post from our friends over at WLTReport. View the original article here.

 

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