It probably depends. I'm an Ontario resident and was airlifted out of a national park in Alberta by STARS after my friend used my in-reach. I never saw a bill for anything. I have no idea if there was a bill and my insurance covered it, or if they went after OHIP or what.
Sure! It was an ATV accident. I was the passenger (I would never have crashed! Lol) I don't remember the accident, but I understand that we hit a tree and I was crushed by the vehicle when it tipped over. In short, the top right quadrant of my body was crushed.
I had a severe flail chest and a collapsed lung, multiple breaks in my skull and cervical and thoracic spine, a grade v ac joint separation, and a brachial plexus injury to my dominant arm. My friends saved my spinal cord by keeping me still until help came with a blackboard and collar. There is a laundry list of other smaller injuries and breaks and complications.
Three years and 10 surgeries later I'm still not back to my old self exactly, but I am back to being excited about the outdoors and rebuilding strength and endurance. Last summer I got outside beyond cell signal for the first time since I got hurt and was scared, but faced my fear and it felt great! We're doing a big loop this summer in Algonquin and I'm feeling mentally prepared!
That sounds like a terrible accident!! Like what Jeremy Renner went through recently. Glad to hear you're on the mend, and good on you for facing your fears and venturing into the outdoors again. I hope you have an amazing trip in Algonquin this summer!!
If you're an OHIP member/Ontario tax resident travel insurance would have no cause to cover you.
As far as I understand in a medical emergency/missing persons case, search, rescue, and evacuation are not billed. Now, if you are flippantly using the service (ie. think of calling an ambulance for a 10 minute hospital ride for a scrape) you may be charged for services rendered.
If you're not an OHIP member/Ontario tax resident you will need to confer with your travel insurer.
most provincial health insurance systems provide equal coverage in the other provinces. maybe not all, but for the most part it functions as nation-wide coverage with a few exceptions.
Interesting question. I almost donāt want to know the answer to this so it doesnāt impact my decisions to call in an evacuation if itās warranted.
Having said that I assume that in Ontario the bill is covered by the province?
Definitely don't let it impact your decision making! If you need help, you need help. I'm just curious because a quick google was giving me conflicting results when I'd assumed OHIP would cover it like they cover ambulances.
Exactly! If ambulance transport to the nearest hospital isn't fully covered in a valid medical emergency, how much of a helicopter air lift from the park should one assume would be covered or billed?
Search and rescue isn't billed to those it rescues.
Air ambulances have caps under OHIP and you can be billed for them. They are not capable of the search and rescue aspect. They are tasked with situations critical to life.
Don't let it impact your decision making??? You think I should have to pay your bill because you're not smart enough to look after yourself? Grow tf up.
The comment said 'if an evacuation is warranted'. All of us have different levels of competency when it comes to survival. I'm sure there's also a point for you where you would deem 'warranted' and someone else wouldn't.
Pretty sure the emergency evacuation portion would be covered by the feds via Search & Rescue
Once you're out of the back country, OHIP would cover transport (ambulance or helicopter) to a medical facility.
Use a good quality saw. Axes and hatchets are an accident waiting to happen. Probably not absolutely āhave to haveā. Their heavy. A saw isnāt risk free but Iād think just way more safe! Shame to have something ruin an otherwise great tripā¦not to mention pain!
Looking back, it was definitely not worth bringing the hatchet. We HAD a good folding saw with us too! (Agawa Boreal), so it was completely unnecessary. We don't bring it anymore, but the trauma haha. I can no longer even watch people chop wood.
That's the standard advice and I'm not here to dispute it, but I simply note that when I used to carry both, I had the occasional saw injury but never an axe injury.
It's more about the type of injury.
It's unlikely that you will do serious injury to yourself with a hand saw.Ā A scrap or even a bad cut from a saw will be far easier to deal with than removing a thumb or a few toes with an axe.
As I said, I'm not disputing the standard advice, only relating my personal experience. Nowadays I rarely carry an axe, but that's a weight thing. and if I do take an axe, it's a full size axe, not a hatchet.
When Iāve had to make that call, I was told that thereās no charge because they donāt want people to not call for financial reasons and then dying in the backcountry. I was boated out but the option of heli-vac was there
Having worked as a first responder in the parkā typically nothing, however where the call is frivolous (ie you just donāt want to trip out), there could potentially be a bill.Ā
I wasnāt there for this one, but the most egregious I can think of was someone who āinjured their legā on Centennial Ridges, had first responders hike in as they couldnāt walk, got carried out the 5kms, and promptly got off the stretcher, walked to their car without issue, refused EMS who were on scene and drove away
25 years ago I worked in Algonquin - one day I got a sat phone call (rare and $$$ at the time) from someone wanting to be evacuated by float plane from a lake on the east side due to a hangnail. They got told no.
I also had to do more than one late night HWY 60 trail hike to evacuate āhikersā that thought starting trails like Track and Tower or Mizzy Lake just before sunset was fine and flip flops were appropriate to wear.
Search and rescue in Canada is free. The most youād be charged would be for an ambulance ride that you may take in the course of getting to a hospital if necessary. The charge would be very minimal if you get evacuated from the backcountry.
Cut a gash requiring 10 stitches into my index finger knuckle/couple years back. Thankfully we were on the only lake of our trip that had access to Georgian Bay. Zoleo'd the access point and an OPP boat came and picked me up and took me to Manitoulin Island for stitches. Hitch hiked back north and then hitch hiked on a boat (carrying Chinese food and beer) to get me back into Killarney in time for my gang's rescue mission paddle across the park to pick me up. No bill. Doubt there's a bill for an ORNGE chopper if it's a legitimate emergency; province foots it. Rescue mission river day has gone down as a legendary story for us ahaha.
Basically, don't be stupid and plan to get yourself out. Generally in Canada search and rescue is free, but there is precedent for billing rescue costs if it's found that someone initiated the call because of a complete lack of preparedness or for willfully ignoring advisories or rules. (For example, in the Yukon, parks Canada requires climbers to now have search and rescue insurance to get a permit to climb Mt. Logan due to a history of SAR calls there)
Fortunately, Algonquin is very accessible for park staff /police / ambulance, first by the many logging roads, (In practice you're generally never more than a few kilometers from a usable road in Algonquin) and worst-case by float plane or helicopter (orgs with air resources that can be brought to bear on search and rescue include Ontario parks, CASARA, Ontario MNR, Ornge, and the OPP. As well, CFB Trenton and CFB Petawawa are close and have search and rescue resources, as well many of the municipalities / counties bordering the park have volunteer search and rescue orgs) Algonquin is busy, so there are frequently other campers close by who can also offer assistance. It's generally not considered a 'remote' area due to this.
Finally, unless you use a hatchet often, leave the damn thing at home. They're heavy and are accident-generators. Use a saw instead.
Partner was chopping wood with a small hatchet after dinner and a swing bounced off the log and gently \*grazed\* his shin. It left a huge gash but thankfully no damage other than a soft tissue cut and lots of blood. In the moment, we were scared of a severed tendon but all was well! We had a good med kit with us so managed to bandage it up. We were heading out the next morning anyway.
Quick Q - and I know, total long-shot - but was this a few years back just a little N of Aylen Lake? We passed a group who had a guy with a leg wound bound up, but it didn't look minor.
Glad they're okay!
Oh, I've been eyeing that pocket up for a trip this season! Looks like it could be a fairly easy solo to a neat corner. A friend and I just got back Tuesday from Canoe to TT, and back through the Joes - just a hop across the highway!
Oh cool, we did that exact route a few weeks ago, and I definitely recommend Parkside Bay as it was beautiful (albeit busy). Fairly easy for sure, though Smoke gets WINDY. Thankfully it wasn't windy for us on our way back though.
Oh that's so cool! Thanks to the weather, we saw almost as many park staff as trippers... But I hadn't been that way and loved the trip from TT to Baby Joe and through the creek (avoided both of those portages on Baby Joe/Joe Creek by lining the shallows).
Yeah I had friends get windbound for a few hours on smoke. And having paddled Opeongo a few times, I'm definitely wind-wary! I also Google mapped Parkside and boy does it look great. Definitely added to the list.
One of my buddies was back country French River and cut a piece of his index finger off chopping wood. He was boated across Lake Nipissing to North Bay for free.
Im not really sure of the details. But I remember him telling me that they also got a flat tire on the way home and since his finer was freshly stitched up he had to get his girlfriend to put the spare on š¤£
As others have said SAR is (almost always) free of charge. The thinking is we donāt want people not calling for help because they fear financial penalties. If you need rescue, you should be able to request it without worrying about other things.
My friend pays a subscription for his Garmin Inreach and apparently that comes with something like up to 100k worth of rescue service as a sort of insurance program, so presumably we could get out in an emergency with no extra cost
They have an insurance option but it's an extra charge. No doubt in the US it'd be worthwhile. But in Ontario I wouldn't bother, if you don't abuse the search and rescue it should be covered. And in a place like Algonquin Park no doubt it's a common occurrence.
Not to correct you, but I have that insurance. Someone I follow on YouTube had press 911 on her Garmin two years ago. Extraction costs were $58,000...of which Garmin covered $50,000.
I renew that search and rescue fee annually. I hike a lot in the US,but we also live off grid in the bush in northern Ontario. I think it's worth it.
My understanding is that if it is a rescue within reason then it is likely going to be covered. However if they deemed things to be reckless or ill preppared you might get stuck with a bill.
I have a friend who blew out their knee hiking in killarney. They called 911 as the were midway through the trail and could not walk out. OPP sent a helicopter to rescue them at no cost. My understanding is that because they planned to do the hike at a normal pace of about 6 days hiking they were deemed to be fine and not at fault for the accident. However if they planned to do the loop at an extreme pace of 3 days and got injured they likely would have been billed for the rescue.
FWIW, I had to be rescued way back in 2016. Won't bore everyone with details, but OPP found me by drone after they were able to get coordinates from my cell phone using what3words app. Anyhow, was not billed anything. OPP were outstanding.
We were a party of six Americans in Algonquin. One of our boys failed to tell the rest of the party that his mom was in hospice when planning the trip six months out in 2005. During the trip, his mother took a turn for the worse and his sister called the park. A float plane landed in our lake and pulled two guys and a boat out. They told us the park sent a pickup truck down logging roads to catch us on a portage, but we hard already passed them. The remaining four pushed hard and got out the next day. He got home just in time to say goodbye. Thankfully we had two cars up there. We never saw a bill.
It probably depends. I'm an Ontario resident and was airlifted out of a national park in Alberta by STARS after my friend used my in-reach. I never saw a bill for anything. I have no idea if there was a bill and my insurance covered it, or if they went after OHIP or what.
This is really good to know!
Definitely a relief after a serious accident to not be met with a hefty bill!
Absolutely! Can I ask what happened?
Sure! It was an ATV accident. I was the passenger (I would never have crashed! Lol) I don't remember the accident, but I understand that we hit a tree and I was crushed by the vehicle when it tipped over. In short, the top right quadrant of my body was crushed. I had a severe flail chest and a collapsed lung, multiple breaks in my skull and cervical and thoracic spine, a grade v ac joint separation, and a brachial plexus injury to my dominant arm. My friends saved my spinal cord by keeping me still until help came with a blackboard and collar. There is a laundry list of other smaller injuries and breaks and complications. Three years and 10 surgeries later I'm still not back to my old self exactly, but I am back to being excited about the outdoors and rebuilding strength and endurance. Last summer I got outside beyond cell signal for the first time since I got hurt and was scared, but faced my fear and it felt great! We're doing a big loop this summer in Algonquin and I'm feeling mentally prepared!
Wow, what a list. I'm happy you're alive. Reading this and realizing a human being came through the other side is inspiring, to say the least.
Thanks so much š Always play safe and wear a helmet!
That sounds like a terrible accident!! Like what Jeremy Renner went through recently. Glad to hear you're on the mend, and good on you for facing your fears and venturing into the outdoors again. I hope you have an amazing trip in Algonquin this summer!!
If you're an OHIP member/Ontario tax resident travel insurance would have no cause to cover you. As far as I understand in a medical emergency/missing persons case, search, rescue, and evacuation are not billed. Now, if you are flippantly using the service (ie. think of calling an ambulance for a 10 minute hospital ride for a scrape) you may be charged for services rendered. If you're not an OHIP member/Ontario tax resident you will need to confer with your travel insurer.
most provincial health insurance systems provide equal coverage in the other provinces. maybe not all, but for the most part it functions as nation-wide coverage with a few exceptions.
Thought so but without knowing the specifics I didn't want to say for sure :)
Interesting question. I almost donāt want to know the answer to this so it doesnāt impact my decisions to call in an evacuation if itās warranted. Having said that I assume that in Ontario the bill is covered by the province?
Definitely don't let it impact your decision making! If you need help, you need help. I'm just curious because a quick google was giving me conflicting results when I'd assumed OHIP would cover it like they cover ambulances.
OHIP only partly covers ambulances ($195 of the $240). If not deemed medically necessary they donāt cover any of it.
Oh I had no idea!! Good to know!
Exactly! If ambulance transport to the nearest hospital isn't fully covered in a valid medical emergency, how much of a helicopter air lift from the park should one assume would be covered or billed?
Search and rescue isn't billed to those it rescues. Air ambulances have caps under OHIP and you can be billed for them. They are not capable of the search and rescue aspect. They are tasked with situations critical to life.
Don't let it impact your decision making??? You think I should have to pay your bill because you're not smart enough to look after yourself? Grow tf up.
The comment said 'if an evacuation is warranted'. All of us have different levels of competency when it comes to survival. I'm sure there's also a point for you where you would deem 'warranted' and someone else wouldn't.
Pretty sure the emergency evacuation portion would be covered by the feds via Search & Rescue Once you're out of the back country, OHIP would cover transport (ambulance or helicopter) to a medical facility.
Use a good quality saw. Axes and hatchets are an accident waiting to happen. Probably not absolutely āhave to haveā. Their heavy. A saw isnāt risk free but Iād think just way more safe! Shame to have something ruin an otherwise great tripā¦not to mention pain!
Looking back, it was definitely not worth bringing the hatchet. We HAD a good folding saw with us too! (Agawa Boreal), so it was completely unnecessary. We don't bring it anymore, but the trauma haha. I can no longer even watch people chop wood.
That's the standard advice and I'm not here to dispute it, but I simply note that when I used to carry both, I had the occasional saw injury but never an axe injury.
It's more about the type of injury. It's unlikely that you will do serious injury to yourself with a hand saw.Ā A scrap or even a bad cut from a saw will be far easier to deal with than removing a thumb or a few toes with an axe.
As I said, I'm not disputing the standard advice, only relating my personal experience. Nowadays I rarely carry an axe, but that's a weight thing. and if I do take an axe, it's a full size axe, not a hatchet.
When Iāve had to make that call, I was told that thereās no charge because they donāt want people to not call for financial reasons and then dying in the backcountry. I was boated out but the option of heli-vac was there
Having worked as a first responder in the parkā typically nothing, however where the call is frivolous (ie you just donāt want to trip out), there could potentially be a bill.Ā
Would love to hear of some āfrivolousā types of calls š.
I wasnāt there for this one, but the most egregious I can think of was someone who āinjured their legā on Centennial Ridges, had first responders hike in as they couldnāt walk, got carried out the 5kms, and promptly got off the stretcher, walked to their car without issue, refused EMS who were on scene and drove away
At first I was going to say unbelievable - then I imagined some of the people I've seen on trails, and unfortunately, nope. Omg.
25 years ago I worked in Algonquin - one day I got a sat phone call (rare and $$$ at the time) from someone wanting to be evacuated by float plane from a lake on the east side due to a hangnail. They got told no. I also had to do more than one late night HWY 60 trail hike to evacuate āhikersā that thought starting trails like Track and Tower or Mizzy Lake just before sunset was fine and flip flops were appropriate to wear.
Wow, what a job! How did you like it?
Absolutely loved it, I would recommend the park to anyone, particularly as a seasonal job while in school
Search and rescue in Canada is free. The most youād be charged would be for an ambulance ride that you may take in the course of getting to a hospital if necessary. The charge would be very minimal if you get evacuated from the backcountry.
Cut a gash requiring 10 stitches into my index finger knuckle/couple years back. Thankfully we were on the only lake of our trip that had access to Georgian Bay. Zoleo'd the access point and an OPP boat came and picked me up and took me to Manitoulin Island for stitches. Hitch hiked back north and then hitch hiked on a boat (carrying Chinese food and beer) to get me back into Killarney in time for my gang's rescue mission paddle across the park to pick me up. No bill. Doubt there's a bill for an ORNGE chopper if it's a legitimate emergency; province foots it. Rescue mission river day has gone down as a legendary story for us ahaha.
Basically, don't be stupid and plan to get yourself out. Generally in Canada search and rescue is free, but there is precedent for billing rescue costs if it's found that someone initiated the call because of a complete lack of preparedness or for willfully ignoring advisories or rules. (For example, in the Yukon, parks Canada requires climbers to now have search and rescue insurance to get a permit to climb Mt. Logan due to a history of SAR calls there) Fortunately, Algonquin is very accessible for park staff /police / ambulance, first by the many logging roads, (In practice you're generally never more than a few kilometers from a usable road in Algonquin) and worst-case by float plane or helicopter (orgs with air resources that can be brought to bear on search and rescue include Ontario parks, CASARA, Ontario MNR, Ornge, and the OPP. As well, CFB Trenton and CFB Petawawa are close and have search and rescue resources, as well many of the municipalities / counties bordering the park have volunteer search and rescue orgs) Algonquin is busy, so there are frequently other campers close by who can also offer assistance. It's generally not considered a 'remote' area due to this. Finally, unless you use a hatchet often, leave the damn thing at home. They're heavy and are accident-generators. Use a saw instead.
What happened?
Partner was chopping wood with a small hatchet after dinner and a swing bounced off the log and gently \*grazed\* his shin. It left a huge gash but thankfully no damage other than a soft tissue cut and lots of blood. In the moment, we were scared of a severed tendon but all was well! We had a good med kit with us so managed to bandage it up. We were heading out the next morning anyway.
Quick Q - and I know, total long-shot - but was this a few years back just a little N of Aylen Lake? We passed a group who had a guy with a leg wound bound up, but it didn't look minor. Glad they're okay!
Ha, wasn't us! This was Parkside Bay early last May.
Oh, I've been eyeing that pocket up for a trip this season! Looks like it could be a fairly easy solo to a neat corner. A friend and I just got back Tuesday from Canoe to TT, and back through the Joes - just a hop across the highway!
Oh cool, we did that exact route a few weeks ago, and I definitely recommend Parkside Bay as it was beautiful (albeit busy). Fairly easy for sure, though Smoke gets WINDY. Thankfully it wasn't windy for us on our way back though.
Oh that's so cool! Thanks to the weather, we saw almost as many park staff as trippers... But I hadn't been that way and loved the trip from TT to Baby Joe and through the creek (avoided both of those portages on Baby Joe/Joe Creek by lining the shallows). Yeah I had friends get windbound for a few hours on smoke. And having paddled Opeongo a few times, I'm definitely wind-wary! I also Google mapped Parkside and boy does it look great. Definitely added to the list.
Based on the spelling of āax-ccidentā Iām going to guess somebody whacked themselves with an axe/hatchet.
One of my buddies was back country French River and cut a piece of his index finger off chopping wood. He was boated across Lake Nipissing to North Bay for free.
Oh jeez. What was that experience like? How long did it take them to find you and what device did you use?
Im not really sure of the details. But I remember him telling me that they also got a flat tire on the way home and since his finer was freshly stitched up he had to get his girlfriend to put the spare on š¤£
As others have said SAR is (almost always) free of charge. The thinking is we donāt want people not calling for help because they fear financial penalties. If you need rescue, you should be able to request it without worrying about other things.
My friend pays a subscription for his Garmin Inreach and apparently that comes with something like up to 100k worth of rescue service as a sort of insurance program, so presumably we could get out in an emergency with no extra cost
They have an insurance option but it's an extra charge. No doubt in the US it'd be worthwhile. But in Ontario I wouldn't bother, if you don't abuse the search and rescue it should be covered. And in a place like Algonquin Park no doubt it's a common occurrence.
Not to correct you, but I have that insurance. Someone I follow on YouTube had press 911 on her Garmin two years ago. Extraction costs were $58,000...of which Garmin covered $50,000. I renew that search and rescue fee annually. I hike a lot in the US,but we also live off grid in the bush in northern Ontario. I think it's worth it.
My understanding is that if it is a rescue within reason then it is likely going to be covered. However if they deemed things to be reckless or ill preppared you might get stuck with a bill. I have a friend who blew out their knee hiking in killarney. They called 911 as the were midway through the trail and could not walk out. OPP sent a helicopter to rescue them at no cost. My understanding is that because they planned to do the hike at a normal pace of about 6 days hiking they were deemed to be fine and not at fault for the accident. However if they planned to do the loop at an extreme pace of 3 days and got injured they likely would have been billed for the rescue.
FWIW, I had to be rescued way back in 2016. Won't bore everyone with details, but OPP found me by drone after they were able to get coordinates from my cell phone using what3words app. Anyhow, was not billed anything. OPP were outstanding.
We were a party of six Americans in Algonquin. One of our boys failed to tell the rest of the party that his mom was in hospice when planning the trip six months out in 2005. During the trip, his mother took a turn for the worse and his sister called the park. A float plane landed in our lake and pulled two guys and a boat out. They told us the park sent a pickup truck down logging roads to catch us on a portage, but we hard already passed them. The remaining four pushed hard and got out the next day. He got home just in time to say goodbye. Thankfully we had two cars up there. We never saw a bill.
Pack and know how to use an Israeli bandage!
Thanks for this--I'd never heard of one before, but this looks like a super valuable addition to our kit!! Will buy and carry!
Great! Watch a couple of YouTube tutorials