Two injured snowmobilers were rescued in separate incidents on Sunday at nearly the same time on Sawtell Peak near Island Park.
The Fremont County Search and Rescue received the first call at around 3:15 p.m. Sunday. A 41-year-old snowmobiler from Garettson, South Dakota, was with a group when he hit a tree on the east side of Sawtell. He was injured and said he was suffering from hip and back pain.
FCSR called an air ambulance to help. However, search and rescue crews were not able to get the helicopter to land so they placed the injured snowmobiler in a banana sled and took him to Sawtelle Peak Road. He was later transported by air ambulance to a local hospital.
The snowmobiler’s current condition is not known.
Following that rescue, FCSR headed about a mile northwest on Sawtell to another injured man, a 22-year-old from Rigby.
Though the man told rescuers by cellphone that he was all right, he had built a snow cave.
The Rigby man had been riding with two friends when he hit a tree. In the process, he damaged the “A-arm” on his snow-machine.
FCSR reached the Rigby man at around 6:30 p.m where he expressed concern that he might have had a concussion.
“The rescuers spent the next three and a half hours navigating a safe route down off of the mountain. They arrived back to base camp shortly after 10 p.m.,” FSCR secretary Eric Thomas said.
Thomas said that weather and rough mountain conditions made it difficult to leave Sawtell with the injured man.
“They spent that whole time working their way out of that mountain. There wasn’t a trail or anything from where he was. It took quite a while to work our way through the trees and terrain,” Thomas said.
Sunday’s incidents bring the total number of snowmobiling accidents in the Island Park area to eight. Two of those involved fatalities.
