The B.C. Coroners Service is investigating the death of an 18-year-old University of Victoria student who died last weekend in a hiking accident in Strathcona Park.
Anders Jason Newman was with a group of six others when the accident occurred, coroner Barb McLintock said Thursday.
“They had camped at Bedwell Lake on Saturday evening and gone hiking on Sunday. He fell near Big Interior Mountain about 8:45 a.m.,” she said, adding: “It is a non-natural death and we investigate all non-natural deaths.”
Strathcona Park is near Courtenay.
Newman was “an extremely well-liked young man who had a promising future,” said Joel Lynn, UVic’s executive director of student services, adding that counselling is available for students affected by his death.
Newman was born in Langley in 1997. “Sadly, on October 25, 2015, Anders passed away doing what he loved … hiking in the beautiful mountains of British Columbia,” said his obituary, published Thursday in the Calgary Herald.
“He was such an awesome young man,” said a condolence message from Mo Wuthrich posted at McInnis and Holloway Funeral Home in Cochrane, Alta. “Kind, seemed to be friends with everyone, empathetic, considerate, sweet, strong and yet he had the gentlest of hearts.”
A celebration of life is scheduled for Saturday in Cochrane.
