COSAR successful search

• RCMP discovered empty car at a crash site
• COSAR helped find the woman after 5-hour search
• She had minor injuries

A five-hour search in West Kelowna that started well before dawn, has had a happy ending.

Just after 4 a.m. RCMP called out Central Okanagan Search and Rescue (COSAR) to assist them in finding a woman after a car accident on Bear Creek Rd.

The driver had failed to make a turn and went 75 meters over an embankment. RCMP said when frontline officers initially arrived at 2:30 a.m. they found the vehicle, but the occupant was missing.

“She did manage to exit the car through the windshield, but that’s all she could remember,” Duane Tresnich, COSAR Search Manager told Kelowna10.

According to COSAR, she used Siri to call 911, but Siri called her emergency contact instead. The driver's emergency contact then called police.

“It’s always a good feeling when you find the subject. You know you spend all that time out there looking [and] you want a very positive outcome and that’s what today was,” Tresnich explained.

The rescue team included two dog teams from both COSAR and the RCMP, 10 search members and an RCMP helicopter. The woman was found at a nearby residence with only minor injuries, and she was treated on scene before being handed to BC Ambulance.

“We don’t know exactly what happened. I know for myself, on my way to the call I had a deer literally jump out in front of me…I had to slam on the breaks and do a swerve. So just at night when you’re driving, be on the lookout for the wildlife,” Tresnich said.

COSAR has received 81 search and rescue calls so far this year which is getting close to their record of 84 calls back in 2020.