Lost Snowboarder Wandered for Days in Snowy High Sierra

Rescuers found the L.A. snowboarder who got lost in a remote area near Mammoth Lakes.

A 34-year-old snowboarder from Los Angeles was found alive after wandering for a week in the near-zero temperatures and 15-foot-deep snow of the High Sierra, officials said Wednesday.

"It was amazing that he survived in that cold," said Joe Rousek, a veteran member of one of the mountain search and rescue teams that found Eric Lemarque. "We knew he was a hockey player, in good shape. But I don't think he'd have lasted another night."

Rousek said Lemarque had struggled more than nine miles across remote, snow-covered mountain terrain after straying from the approved ski and snowboard runs at the Mammoth Mountain resort February 6.

Lacking food and overnight gear. Lemarque survived by eating pine needles and pine nuts and by building a crude igloo for shelter, his mother said.

"He kept his wits," said Susan Lemarque of Sherman Oaks.

Searchers picked up his trail February 12, and a helicopter spotted him the next morning, sprawled in the snow.

"He wasn't moving," Rousek said. "But he was still conscious."

Lemarque was flown out by helicopter and taken to Mammoth Hospital in Mammoth Lakes, where he underwent several days of treatment for dehydration, mild hypothermia and severe frostbite to his left foot.

He was later transferred to the Grossman Burn Center at Sherman Oaks Hospital.

His mother said the frostbite he suffered required treatment similar to that used for severe bums.

"He's in better physical condition than anyone ever thought he could be," she said.

Susan Lemarque said her son, who is single, was born in Paris and played hockey for the French national team in the 1994 Olympics. She said he had made a career as a hockey teacher in the Los Angeles area.

"He loves the outdoors," she said.

She said her son went to Mammoth Lakes on a trip with friends February 2.

Officials said that after his friends left the resort to return home, Lemarque went snowboarding alone February 6.

"He said he went off the track," Susan Lemarque said. "When it got dark, he couldn't tell quite where he was. He continued on down the mountain, thinking he'd find his way out."

Officials said Lemarque had wandered into a vast, empty area that stretches for miles down the western slopes of California's tallest mountains.

Susan Lemarque said he had been gone for several days before anyone realized he was missing. When she couldn't reach him by phone, she told Lemarque's father, Philip Lemarque, who headed to the resort, about 300 miles north of Los Angeles.

"They checked the condo" at the resort, she said. "The only thing missing was him and his board."

The search began February 11, five days after he disappeared. The effort included the Mammoth Mountain resort's Ski Patrol, the Inyo County Search and Rescue Team and the Mono County Search and Rescue Team, of which Rousek, 49, is a member.

"There were about 14 of us on skis, plus a couple of dogs," Rousek said. "We were looking for signs of where he might have gone. The ski patrol found his tracks. Then they found a place where he had stopped and tried to light a fire. That's a sign a person is in trouble."

Rousek said the tracks continued downhill, deeper and deeper into the backcountry. Then, unaccountably, they veered left, up the steep slopes of a peak called Pumice Mountain.

"He climbed a couple of thousand feet up that mountain," Rousek said. "When you're hypothermic, you're not thinking so good."

The search was halted temporarily by darkness on the night of February 12.

That same night, Susan Lemarque said, her son began to worry for the first time.

"He said it had been so long," she said. "And it was so cold."

The search resumed at dawn. At about 11 a.m., a helicopter that had joined the effort spotted a still figure in the snow.

Rescuers reached Lemarque within a few minutes.

"He's in good spirits." his mother said. "He's so happy to be alive."