Featured image taken from Dave Treadway on Facebook
Canadian professional skier Dave Treadway died after falling into a crevasse in Pemberton, British Columbia, Canada, yesterday, April 15, 2019, according to Pique News Magazine. He was 34. There are unconfirmed reports that he fell after a snow bridge he was crossing collapsed. The Canadian skier is survived by his pregnant wife, Tessa, and two sons, Kasper and Raffi.
According to Pique News, Pemberton District Search and Rescue (PSAR) responded to a backcountry skier that was unresponsive after falling 30 meters (~98 feet) down a crevasse near Rhododendron Mountain. Officials have not released his name, but it has been confirmed by friends via social media that it was Dave Treadway.
David Mckenzie, head of PSAR, told Pique that 14 members from both the Pemberton and Whistler rescue crews attended to retrieve Treadway, who had succumbed to his injuries on-scene.
“I would say the depth of the crevasse was paramount to the operation,” Mckenzie explained to the Whistler news outlet. “Having to put in various ice anchors and protection and getting our team down into the crevasse to access the subject was one thing, and then being able to actually rig it back up so that they could be pulled back up to the surface was another.”
After years of focus on his professional skiing career, Treadway had dedicated himself to his family in recent years, living on the road in an RV with them and signing off from personal social media in favor of the @freerange.family Instagram handle. There he would highlight the adventures he’d take with his two sons and wife. He had put out a series of videos featuring his five-year-old son, Kasper, quickly progressing as a young skier—even going heli-skiing and shredding on his snowmobile at the age of 3. Treadway would push these videos out via email to media members, where he would include in-depth family updates, the ups, and downs, of parenting and gush about his two sons.
On skis, Treadway was known for his prowess in big-mountain terrain, always skiing aggressively and not afraid to send it big, and was a staple in the pages of FREESKIER throughout the years. He, along with his two older brothers, Dan and Daryl, came up together as skiers in the Whistler area.
FREESKIER will report more as updates become available; we extend condolences to friends, family and all those touched by Treadway.
