Chris Watson recently achieved a successful result for his client, Ian Manson, an avid outdoorsman.

Manson was injured during a mountaineering expedition in July 2021 on Mt. Rogers in Glacier National Park, British Columbia. The incident arose when Jeffrey Mitchell, the guide Manson had hired, testing the stability of a rock – allegedly without warning or proper precautions – with Manson directly below. The rock fell, requiring Manson to move quickly to avoid a direct hit and causing him to fall backward. Manson and Mitchell were tethered together by safety rope but unanchored. Both climbers were pulled from the face of Mt. Rogers, falling several metres to ledges below. Long-line helicopter rescuers evacuated them from the mountain.

Manson sued Mitchell, Mitchell’s operating company, and the Association of Canadian Mountain Guides for negligence.

The Mt. Rogers expedition was the third trip that Manson and Mitchell had taken together that summer. The defendants raised the issue of a digital waiver that Manson had signed for the first of those three trips. The defendants argued that the digital waiver was meant to release them from all liability for all future trips that summer, and that it served as a full answer and defence to the claim.

The parties sought to determine the applicability of the waiver by summary trial. Determining whether the waiver applied to the Mt. Rogers expedition was an exercise in contractual interpretation. The overriding goal when interpreting a contract is to determine the intent of the parties and the scope of their understanding at the time the contract was made. The central question at trial was what the parties’ mutual and objective intention was when the waiver was signed. After reviewing the wording of the waiver and the surrounding circumstances when it was signed, the summary trial judge ruled in Manson’s favour, finding that the waiver applied only to the first trip (2023 BCSC 723). The defendants appealed that decision.

The B.C. Court of Appeal dismissed the defendants’ appeal, upholding the lower court’s decision in an April 2024 ruling (2024 BCCA 142). As a result of the court’s ruling, Manson is now free to pursue his claim for damages for physical and psychological injuries and resulting economic loss.