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SHAWNIGAN LAKE, B.C. – Sunlight reflecting off emergency blankets helped signal a rescue helicopter as it hovered above dense bush on Vancouver Island trying to spot an injured hiker.

First responders used the low-tech, but effective method early Monday evening while assisting a severely injured man.

He had tumbled into a six metre-deep crevasse on a steep, remote and densely wooded slope east of Shawnigan Lake, about 45 kilometres northwest of Victoria.

The victim had serious injuries to his lower body, requiring an airlift to hospital, but the helicopter crew had to find him first.

That’s when paramedics and search teams on the ground used sunlight bouncing off emergency blankets as a giant beacon to summon the chopper to the site on Old Baldy Mountain.

Once spotted, rescue technicians were lowered more than 20 metres to the ground, loaded the man in a basket and winched him aboard the hovering helicopter for the flight to a Victoria hospital, where he is now recovering.

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