Search for missing skier ramps up over weekend

A week after Dr. Jonathan Torgerson vanished in the backcountry near Whitefish Mountain Resort, the search-and-rescue effort is intensifying.

Flathead County Sheriff Chuck Curry told the Daily Inter Lake on Friday that the approximately 25-person search party will double by Saturday, as help arrives from Lewis and Clark and Gallatin counties.

Involved agencies include the Sheriff’s Office, U.S. Forest Service, Flathead County Search and Rescue, North Valley Search and Rescue, and the Flathead Nordic Backcountry Patrol. They’re conducting a “methodical, tree-by-tree” search in a 350-to-400-acre zone east of Whitefish Mountain Resort’s Flower Point area, where Torgerson was last seen. The Two Bear Air helicopter was not flying Friday.

Curry said that currently, the search is set to continue through the weekend.

A winter storm is expected to hit the area Saturday, with more than a foot of new snow possible in the mountains. Winds could gust as high as 55 mph.

Torgerson, 62, was reportedly skiing alone when he left the ski resort boundary near the Flower Point area on Saturday, Feb. 17. Torgerson is a Columbia Falls resident and a physician who works at North Valley Hospital in Whitefish.

Reporter Patrick Reilly can be reached at preilly@dailyinterlake.com, or at 758-4407.