George Herald | Musical duo survives freezing night

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Musical duo survives freezing night
10:00 (GMT+2), Thu, 05 July 2012

Benjamin and Avigail expressed their sincere gratitude for the mammoth efforts of the search team who braved extreme temperatures to look for them in the Kaaimanskloof area.

GEORGE NEWS - The local emergency services pulled out all the stops on Friday evening for a full-scale search involving the Skymed AMS helicopter and police dogs when virtuoso musicians Benjamin (27) and Avigail (24) Bushakevitz failed to navigate their way out of the Kaaimans forest in the dark.

On Saturday morning the two emerged unscathed, after spending a freezing night trapped in a narrow gorge at the Kaaimans River.

Relating their ordeal to the George Herald, Benjamin said the most frightening and frustrating part was being able to hear the sounds of a mountain rescue search party looking for them. "We were in no-man's-land. We could hear the police dogs barking, and searchers calling out for us. But in the pitch dark the terrain was just impossible." The area on NMMU Saasveld Campus upstream from the George Municipality's pumping station has a sheer cliff face that requires climbing ropes and climbing gear.

Carrying just one bottle of water and a cellphone, the two had set off at 11:00 on Friday, hoping to find the kloofing area used by Eden Adventures. They had parked their car at one end of the old stone bridges along the old Seven Passes Road. They got wet wading through sections of the river. At 02:00 at night they made their last telephonic contact when Avigail sobbed and relayed their predicament to her mother, Leonore Bushakevitz, saying "Mom ... I'm a dying." Afterwards she said she had meant dying of cold.

Help
But by then their mom Leonore, who had been gravely worried about their failure to return from the hike, had called for the help of Deon van Wyk, deputy Fire Chief of Eden District Municipality and a family friend, Arian Wessels who knows the area well. What had put Van Wyk on the wrong track is a relayed message which said that the twins were lost. This made him think that they had left the riverine area.

"We had stuck to the river all the time and were not lost but simply found it impossible to retrace and walk back, because in the dark and being half-frozen, it had become near impossible to do so." They had tried to keep their blood circulation going by moving, but had been unable to dry their clothes.

Freezing
The temperature had dropped to 4 degrees and emergency workers had arrived with an ambulance, in case it was needed to treat the brother and sister for hypothermia (a condition in which the core temperature drops below the required temperature for normal body functions). By Saturday morning at about 08:30, their friend Wessels located them almost at the same time that the Skymed crew spotted them. The exhausted musicians were lifted with a rescue buggy onto the Saasveld Campus grounds, where the other members of the rescue team were waiting with dry clothes, and warm drinks.
Richard Botha of Metro EMS said that apart from Skymed AMS helicopter, the George and Eden District Fire Services, the Police Search and Rescue and the Lions Club were all involved in the search.

Invites
Violionist Avigail, who has been invited to conduct a youth orchestra is leaving this month for a concert tour which will include a BBC Proms in London. Guitarist/trumpeter Benjamin will be performing at the Outeniqua Farmers Market this coming Saturday.

ARTICLE AND PHOTO: PAULINE LOURENS, GEORGE HERALD JOURNALIST