Sask. man followed a track to rescue missing girl from snow

The volunteer firefighter with the Foam Lake Fire department who found a missing 11-year-old girl in the snow a few miles from her home near Wynyard says he does not consider himself a hero.

“I don’t think of myself as that. I’m just doing my part as a citizen,” said Cole Maksymytz.

But it’s hard not to consider his life-saving actions heroic after he rescued the unconscious girl who was found face down in the snow, near a frozen slough.

The search and rescue team, RCMP and local volunteers were called out after the girl reportedly walked away from her home on Thursday.

RCMP said in a new release on Friday she had been home sick that day, but when her mother got home, she was gone.

Maksymytz wasn’t actually called out to the scene but said he was compelled to go there when he saw police cruisers go by.

“I checked my phone to see if I got any calls from dispatch and I hadn’t. I was kind of curious as to what was happening,” Maksymytz said, adding he drove out anyways.

When he got there, he stopped to talk to investigators on the scene. They told him snowmobiles and police dogs were on their way, so Maksymytz headed home.

He took a back road.

“I took a drive down there and I came across some footprints,” remembered Maksymytz. “At first, I thought it could be deer or a moose. I got out of the truck and took a look and they were footprints from a person — and they were small.”

The volunteer firefighter followed the track away from the road until he found the girl in the snow — just beyond a bush, about four miles from her home.

“We weren’t sure how long she was out there. I didn’t know until they got her back to the ambulance, she was out there three hours longer than they originally thought,” Maksymytz said.

He carried the unconscious girl back to his truck and kept her there until paramedics showed up.

“I do believe after 10 minutes, I know she was talking already to them,” Maksymytz said.

RCMP said in a new release on Friday she is being treated for hypothermia.