Elaborate escape successful

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This article was published 15/02/2015 (4116 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

IT’s the quintessential Canadian nightmare, played out on river ice.

Tied to two Zambonis and, like two loyalties, being torn in opposite directions: hockey versus home life, passion versus duty.

Trust Dean Gunnarson to escape that one, too.

Winnipeg’s world-famous escape artist pulled off another one Saturday, in the middle of Red River ice, in a -35 wind chill.

Gunnarson, chained by the waist, arms and hands to two Zambonis racing by him in opposite directions — and they can go faster than you’d think — had 60 seconds to free himself before the Zambonis pulled the chains tight.

Spoiler alert: He is still flying to India this morning to perform his ninth escape attempt for a television series called Escape or Die, which will start to air on the Outdoor Learning Network in April.

Gunnarson said it was “really tough” to undo the padlocks and chains in the arctic conditions.

“I was going to do one more chain padlocked around my neck, and my safety co-ordinator talked me out of it. I barely made it with what I had. I literally would have had my head torn off,” he said.

There’s added difficulty because Gunnarson needed to use his bare hands to free himself, on a day when people’s hands were freezing almost instantly when they weren’t protected.

Gunnarson held hand-warmer pouches for a while but tossed them away minutes before the start.

“You get so into it and so focused, and your adrenalin is going so much, that you can eliminate the pain and distraction for a certain length of time,” he said.

Gunnarson said he planned to warm up in India this week.

“We go from -36 degree weather, to plus 36,” he said.

Gunnarson said it meant a lot to him to do one of his escapes for the 12-episode series in his home town. The Forks had approached him about doing an escape there. “What do you do in the middle of winter? Let’s do something on ice. OK, what would be totally Canadian? Being pulled apart by Zambonis.”

He said he’s extraordinarily happy about the TV series.

“This is an amazing gig. I wanted to have my own TV series since I was 16, a student at River East Collegiate,” he said.

Escapes have been shot in China, Columbia, the Bahamas, Iceland, Texas and Miami, so far.

“We’ve been filming for five months straight. It’s a big production,” Gunnarson said.

In India, he’ll be locked in a steel coffin and buried alive six feet underground for 24 hours, without food or water, before he tries to escape.

Each episode begins at his home in Onanole, in Riding Mountain National Park, where he lives with his family.

The series will be shown across the globe, including in Asia, Europe, South America and the United States.

About 70 people turned out to witness Saturday’s escape, a crowd somewhat winnowed by the frigid conditions when the event was delayed about 30 minutes. Two City of Winnipeg ice-surfacing machines were used for the stunt.

“I’ve done a lot of stuff in this river,” Gunnarson said in his introduction, referring to the time he almost died trying to escape a wooden coffin lowered into the river. He was just 18 at the time, on Halloween in 1983. “I’ve never done anything above the river before.”

In 2012, Gunnarson was awarded the Merlin Award for “world’s best escape artist” by the International Society of Magicians, the world’s largest magic organization. It was the first time the award was given to an escape artist since it was first presented in 1968.

bill.redekop@freepress.mb.caã