When their snowmobile plummeted down a deep ravine and crashed into an ice-covered stream, 11-year-old Leia Hunt-Hans braved the cold and complete darkness, and ignored the howling wolves to find help for her injured father.
The young girl walked for about three kilometres in Wentworth-Nord, Que. before she returned to her father. They huddled together the rest of the night, wet and cold as the mercury dropped to 27 degrees below. In the morning, she set out down a snowmobile path, walking another six kilometres before people on snowmobiles found her. They told her that her father had been rescued in her absence.
Leia's right foot and left toes had to be amputated.
For her bravery that night in March of 2003 she was awarded Friday one of two Stars of Courage by given out by Governor-General Adrienne Clarkson at a Rideau Hall ceremony in Ottawa. The bravery medal is awarded “for acts of conspicuous courage in circumstances of great peril.”
In total, 35 people, aged 11-75, received the Stars of Courage and Medals of Bravery. Family members received the medals for recipients who were honoured posthumously.
In Ms. Clarkson's prepared remarks she lauded recipients for making the “choice between self-preservation and action. You are the only ones who know why you chose the ultimate unselfish act.”
In the statement, she added, “You remind us of the best that lies within the human heart ... I wish that every Canadian could be in this room today.”
Jacqueline Watt of Saskatchewan, who died trying to keep a man from stabbing his estranged girlfriend and their son, received the Medal of Bravery posthumously. She was stabbed while letting the mother run for help and keeping the attacker from getting close to the toddler, who also survived.
James Bates and Daniel MacInnis, of Nova Scotia, received Medals of Bravery for rescuing a man and his four-year-old son from drowning. The two non-swimmers saw the father and son's rubber float carried away by heavy winds and paddled out after them.
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