Mother of avalanche survivor can’t forget rescuers

Martin Griffith

Monday, Feb. 15, 1999 | 8:56 a.m.

RENO, Nev. - The mother of a college student who survived a deadly Feb. 6 avalanche in the Sierra Nevada is taking pains to recognize the efforts of his rescuers.

Myra Lerch of Chico, Calif., plans to write a letter to Dartmouth College officials praising a Dartmouth alumni group that rescued her son, Derek, 21, and his girlfriend, Marisa Nelson, 20, near Truckee, Calif.

Friend Harry Eichelberger, 21, of Chicago, managed to dig out of the snow and summon help from about 17 group members at a nearby cabin, more than four hours after the avalanche.

Using rakes, brooms and mops as probes, the group also rescued Malcolm Russell Hart, 21, of Madbury, N.H., but he later died of cardiac arrest at a Truckee hospital.

"I'm going to write the president of Dartmouth and the alumni association and tell them that they should be proud of them," Mrs. Lerch said.

"They're true heroes. If they had not been so knowledgeable about mountaineering, we might have lost Derek and Marisa as well. A parent couldn't ask for more."

The four college students were on a sledding expedition near Donner Pass when the avalanche occurred. The men are University of California, Berkeley students while Nelson attends Butte Community College in Chico, where Mrs. Lerch is an instructor.

Mrs. Lerch faxed a thank you letter to the Dartmouth group last week, and plans to meet with them sometime later this year.

"They've told us their greatest thanks was to know the three are alive," she said. "But we will find a way to really hug and thank each of them. Derek and Harry would like to get together with them, too."

All three survivors plan to attend a memorial service for Hart in New Hampshire on Friday. A date for a memorial service at UC-Berkeley has not been set.

Mrs. Lerch also has talked to UC-Berkeley officials about planting a memorial tree from Italy on the campus for Hart, who was an Italian studies major.