The Snowboarder Who Survived For Days After Getting Lost In the Wilderness
by Pauli Poisuo
Like any sport that involves hurtling down snowy mountain slopes at perilous velocities, snowboarding can be a bit dangerous. However, as Eric LeMarque found out the hard way, the “hurtling down” part isn’t necessarily the most perilous aspect of the sport. It very much can be the snowy mountain itself, which is more than happy to try to kill you in slow motion.
As a former professional ice hockey player who had played for France at the 1994 Winter Olympics in Lillehammer, LeMarque was obviously a pretty fit dude. So, when he set out for some solo snowboarding on February 6, 2004, it should have been just another fun, sports-filled Friday.
It definitely was sports-filled, but there wasn't much in the way of fun.
OK, I guess there was some fun.
Thanks to heavy fog in the area, LeMarque ended up riding his snowboard outside the official paths, which caused him to thoroughly lose his way, and that was a problem. Another not-insignificant issue: He obviously wasn’t carrying the equipment for a days-long survival mission in the wilderness. Olympian or not, a week in the cold, windy mountains of Sierra Nevada, California in February is no easy feat – especially because his gear consisted of little more than an MP3 player, some bubblegum, matches, and a cell phone.
As luck would have it, the phone was dead, the matches were wet, and he was afraid that the sugary bubblegum would attract nearby coyotes, so he ditched that crap. However, the snowboard and the MP3 player more than made up for the other equipment’s uselessness. The board became a handy makeshift axe, and he could use the radio signals the MP3 player picked up to determine which direction he should go. Unfortunately, once he figured out how to do that, he realized that he’d been walking in the exact wrong direction for some time, venturing even further into the wilderness.
LeMarque sought shelter wherever and however he could. He initially spent the night under a tree, and eventually upgraded to a crude snow shelter that he attempted to insulate with tree bark; he also ate said bark. Perhaps nature thought he was doing too well at first, because the difficulty level of his ordeal periodically increased.
At one point, LeMarque located a stream; while reaching for water, the ledge he was on gave way and he fell into the water, because of course. Now completely wet, he had to strip naked, in a bid to dry his clothes a little. And here, friends, is where we’d probably end our story in most every alternate reality. After all, there’s only one reasonable outcome for a scenario in which a buck-naked man is stranded out in the cold, with nothing but a snowboard, an MP3 player, and a heap of wet clothes.
Indeed, a week after LeMarque’s disappearance, the authorities found the remains of a man who had succumbed to the elements and been partially eaten by wildlife. That man ... was absolutely not Eric LeMarque, but another lost skier. Meanwhile, the former hockey player was still very much alive. He’d merely decided that instead of wandering around near the bottom of the mountains, he should climb one instead, and ended up scaling 1,200 feet before he was found.
In all fairness, it wasn’t like he could have kept going forever — the rescue was a last-minute one. At this point, he was missing one of his boots, and his feet were numb with frostbite. But that still didn’t stop him from climbing, mind you.
The experience did take its toll, and LeMarque ended up losing both of his feet to severe frostbite. However, he retained a positive outlook, and even plans on returning to snowboarding as soon as he can.
As a cherry on top of this already unbelievable survival sundae, LeMarque says he also used his ordeal as a handy way to kick a drug habit. He was carrying a bag of meth on the day he got lost, but ended up dumping the contents in the snow, and hasn’t touched the stuff since.
