*** Searchers Find Body of Avalanched Outdoorsman ***

Date: Tue, 21 Jan 1997 08:37:50 +0000
From: Bruce Bowler <cozylog@Alaska.NET>
To: sarinfo@mindlink.bc.ca
Subject: Search Dog finds Avalanche Victim

Anchorage Daily News 1/19/97
AVALANCHE KILLS FISHING GUIDE, CARVER
SEARCHERS FIND 39-YEAR-OLD'S BODY NEAR SWAN LAKE AT RESURRECTION PASS
 
 By RACHEL D'ORO
 Daily News reporter:

   Rescuers found the body of an experienced outdoorsman a day
 after he was caught in an avalanche while hunting for moose
 antlers with a friend at Resurrection Pass, Alaska State Troopers
 said Sunday.

   Lance Domonoske, a 39-year-old horn carver and drift-boat
 fishing guide from Sterling, probably was killed instantly when
 the avalanche struck Friday, according to Trooper Craig Macdonald
 at the Cooper Landing post. Saturday afternoon, rescuers found
 Domonoske's body, buried beneath 4 feet of hard-packed snow about
 11/2 miles southeast of Swan Lake, Macdonald said.
 The avalanche covered a three-quarter-mile-wide swath on the
 slope of the unnamed mountain, Macdonald said.
 
  Domonoske had joined a longtime friend, John Lesterson of
 Sterling, at a Swan Lake cabin Thursday to begin the quest for
 antlers shed by male moose in the winter. The men searched the
 area on snowmachines, Lesterson said.
 
  Shortly before noon Friday, Domonoske spotted some antlers high
 up on a distant slope. Lesterson didn't want to go, so the men
 agreed to meet at the trail head around dusk. When Domonoske
 failed to show up, his friend waited for more than an hour, then
 backtracked to the slope of the mountain, Lesterson said.
 
  About 7 p.m., Lesterson found Domonoske's snowmachine at the
 edge of the avalanche. But his friend was nowhere to be found.
 Lesterson drove back to Sterling, about 30 miles away, and called
 Troopers, then spoke to Domonoske's wife, Laurie, who was waiting
 with the couple's two young children and her 15-year-old stepson.

   "That was the hardest message I ever had to give," Lesterson
 said. "He was such a great man. His family meant everything to
 him. Everyone is just devastated."

   But friends and rescuers alike held out hope that Domonoske
 somehow escaped injury and simply fled. Troopers quickly put out a
 call, and by 10:30 volunteer rescuers began arriving.

   The search team consisted of two Alaska Search and Rescue dogs,
 as well as more than 30 people, including Domonoske's friends,
 troopers and members of Alaska Mountain Rescue Group, Nordic Ski
 Patrol, Alaska Snowmachine Search and Rescue, Bear Creek Search
 and Rescue and Alaska Air National Guard, 210th Rescue Squadron.
 A search and rescue dog named Zip led the volunteers to the
 body, Macdonald said. He said avalanche warnings were posted
 throughout the area.

   "People need to be aware of the risks of being in an avalanche
 area," Macdonald said. "There's no safe winter access here."
 But by all accounts, Domonoske had taken countless trips through
 the same site since he first taught himself to carve moose and
 caribou antlers and Dall sheep horns in the early 1980s, a couple
 of years after moving to Alaska from Seattle. Friends and family
 said he was a seasoned and careful outdoorsman, both on his antler
 hunts and while leading summer fishing treks on the Kenai and
 Kasilof rivers.
 
  "The only way anyone could be more experienced was if they were
 involved in professional rescues," said Tom Hanes, president of
 the Kenai River Guides Association. "This is shocking because he
 spent so much time outdoors. And because he was such a good guy. I
 think the only mistake he made was being in the wrong place at the
 wrong time."
 
  To Domonoske, in fact, Resurrection Pass was the most beautiful
 place in the world, his wife said Sunday. So family and friends
 plan to scatter his ashes over the area on his birthday in August,
 she said. A memorial service is scheduled for 7 p.m. Wednesday in
 the Sterling Elementary School gym.

   "He loved us so much," Laurie Domonoske said in a choking voice.
 "He told us every day how he felt so fortunate in his life, with
 his family and everything he did. He felt bad for people who
 didn't have the advantages he did. He felt so lucky that he had
 everything."

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