Mounties rescued from Idaho backcountry

Two Canadian Mounties were rescued Friday night in the backcountry of Boundary County, Idaho, according to a statement from Boundary County Sheriff’s Deputy Tim Day.

The Royal Mounted Police officers were patrolling the border by snowmobile when they became stuck in deep, soft snow near the Grass Creek area. The creek is in a remote, heavily forested area north of Upper Priest Lake.

The sheriff’s office was notified at about 3 p.m. that the Mounties were overdue from a patrol. The county’s volunteer search and rescue team was dispatched and worked with U.S. Border Patrol officers to search for the Mounties. They were found safe at about 8:30 p.m.

Despite the mild weather, 4 feet of snow covers parts of the high country, said Dan Lockman with the Boundary County Search and Rescue team. Lockman, who was not part of the rescue, said he was told it took more than an hour to dig the Mounties and their machines out of the snow.

“The snow is so soft and it breaks through so easy,” he said.

The Creston, B.C., detachment of the Royal Mounted Police did not return a call seeking comment. The U.S. Border Patrol office in Spokane was also unable to comment on the matter.

Lockman, the search and rescue volunteer, said he doesn’t know for certain why the Mounties became lost south of the border. He said the two nations often share patrolling duties.

The area is remote, he said, and without many roads or formal border markers.