Kalispell man survives rock slide

Sam McBride heard it before he saw it.

Then he was buried to his waist in a rock slide that broke his leg, three ribs and some vertebrae.

"I was speechless. I couldn't even scream," he said Monday.

McBride, 31, of Kalispell was working Feb. 2 with a crew from Glacier Stone Supply collecting ledge rock at a quarry near Marion.

"We hit a soft spot. You could hear it coming," he said.

It started with a pebble, he said. Then the rocks started to fall down the face of the 50-foot talus slope.

There was no time to move.

"They wrapped around my legs," he said.

Then they knocked him off his feet, leaving him helpless while rocks weighing between 10 and 115 pounds barreled down the hill.

He credits his co-workers with saving his life.

"The crew didn't hesitate," he said.

They freed his broken body and moved him out of danger - just before another slide let loose.

McBride was conscious and hurting.

Marion Ambulance and Fire Department responded. The ambulance took him to Idaho Hill on U.S. 2, where the ALERT helicopter swooped in to fly him to Kalispell Regional Medical Center.

He was discharged from the hospital on Monday.

"It will take six weeks for my leg to heal," McBride said.

The owner of the stone business, Dave Wilkins, and his wife, Catherine, "have been real nice to me," McBride said.

They told him he can come back to work on light duty when he's ready.

"He's a hard-working employee," Wilkins said of McBride. "Our biggest push is on safety, but that doesn't mean there aren't potential hazards."

McBride's convalescence is filled with gratitude.

"It's good to work with people who know what they're doing … If it wasn't for the crew from Glacier Stone, I wouldn't be here," he said.

The rock slide didn't shake his sense of humor loose.

"I got rocked," he said.

Reporter Chery Sabol may be reached at 758-4441 or by e-mail at csabol@dailyinterlake.com.