A dogsled accident has left a Skagway, Alaska, man facing a $20,000 hospital bill, but the Yukon community of Mount Lorne is moving ahead to help him out.
On April 21, a dance, silent auction and cake auction will be held at the community centre to help raise money for Bob Fink.
Mr. Fink, who rents a cabin in Mount Lorne, near Whitehorse, through the winter, was injured while taking a friend out on a dogsled ride about two weeks ago.
"Mushing's a passion for me," he said yesterday from the Almost Home Maternity Home in Whitehorse, where he is recovering.
Mr. Fink was running five dogs with a passenger in the sled.
In the first two minutes, Mr. Fink took the nearly-90 degree turn from the driveway to the trail, not realizing how icy it was, and the sled hit a berm. "It was basically like an icy lake," he said, adding he remembers thinking the person in the sled was getting a "hell of a ride."
After his fall, he continued to hang on to the sled. What likely saved his life, he said, was a technique he learned years ago to get the dogs to stop on command.
He was dragged for a distance before the dogs listened to him. "I knew I was hurting," he said.