A month after suspending operations, search and rescue teams in Golden, B.C., are once again ready to save lost or injured hikers.
Golden Search and Rescue closed shop in June after the society was named in a lawsuit filed by the family of Marie-Josee Fortin, a Quebec woman who died in the B.C. backcountry in February.
The lawsuit sparked fears among rescue teams across the province about the lack of liability insurance for rescue workers.
"They don't want to lose their houses, families, all the things that they've worked for because of some litigation against a volunteer organization," Kamloops Search and Rescue president Brad Russell said.
Provincial Emergency Program operations director Chris Duffy says the Golden team returned to active status Monday, after the group's liability concerns were resolved.
Duffy says the PEP and search and rescue groups met July 16 and reached a 15-point draft proposal to address the liability issue.
Fortin died of hypotethermia after seven days lost in the wilderness with her husband, Gilles Blackburn.
Blackburn claims that search and rescue teams -- as well as the RCMP and the Kicking Horse Mountain Resort where he and his wife were staying -- were informed of SOS signals he stamped into the snow, but a search was not launched.
With files from The Canadian Press
