Rockslide shuts down B.C. highway before wedding, stranding father-of-the-bride

In the weeks leading up to Tazz Norris and Lisa Lalonde’s Penticton wedding, they already had guests cancel due to wildfires, smoke and the travel ban, which was rescinded earlier than anticipated.

In the weeks leading up to Tazz Norris and Lisa Lalonde’s Penticton wedding, they already had guests cancel due to wildfires, smoke and the travel ban, which was rescinded earlier than anticipated.

The couple did not think they would have another roadblock on their big day.

“The fires kept creeping down and then moving back and creeping down and we're moving back and you know, and then I said, ‘Oh, you know what's the worst can happen?’ And then the landslide happened,” Norris recalled.

On Monday afternoon, just three-and-a-half hours before Norris and Lalonde were set to tie the knot, a rockslide spilling 3,000 cubic metres of material crashed down on Highway 97 between Summerland and Peachland.

Lalonde’s 92-year-old father was on his way to the wedding with the rest of the family from Kelowna.

“We drove up to the slide and of course, we couldn't get through. We had to come back and we didn't know how we were going to get to the wedding,” Jack Lalonde told CTV News.

“At my age, I just sat by and let other people figure it out because I couldn't do anything.”