2 riders ticketed in 2000

The Daily Inter Lake

Two of the three snowmobilers involved in an avalanche in Jewel Basin last week were ticketed by the U.S. Forest Service for an access violation six years ago.

Ryan Roberts and his uncle, Larry Roberts, were issued misdemeanor citations with $100 fines for using a trail that had been ordered closed by a federal judge. The trail reached Krause Basin along the Swan Mountain Range.

The Forest Service announced last week that the two men would be cited along with a third man, Ryan Sonju, for snowmobiling Thursday in the Jewel Basin, an area that has been off limits to snowmobiling for 25 years.

Ryan Roberts was buried for eight hours in an avalanche near Wildcat Lake. He survived after a group of family and friends located him and managed to reverse the effects of severe hypothermia.

The March 2000 incident involved six snowmobilers, including the two Roberts men, who used a trail that was deemed to have been illegally cut into the forest to provide access to Krause Basin, which is open to snowmobiling.

At the time, the snowmobilers maintained that they were attempting to avoid the trail in order to reach the basin.

But judging from snowmobile tracks, Forest Service law enforcement officers determined the group had been within the 20-foot-wide closed corridor that was marked with survey ribbons.

The court-ordered closure of the trail proved to be extremely controversial among snowmobilers and multiple use advocates.