It’s June 1994. A young man living in Surrey, Michael Schmidt, works as a humble bus driver downtown. Like everyone in Metro Vancouver, his attention is laser-focused on the Canucks. The playoffs are getting fierce; it looks like Vancouver could pull off its first Stanley Cup win in nearly a century.
Game 7 starts on the night of the 14th, and Mike is there with his friends, ready to experience the win of a lifetime. It never comes. Vancouver stumbles, losing 3-2 to the New York Rangers. There’s a moment of shock. “How could this happen; we were so close?” Mike thinks to himself. That contemplation is short lived, because within minutes of Game 7’s end, the people of Vancouver completely lose it.
Fans surge out of Pacific Coliseum, pure fury guiding their every move. The chaos passes through Hastings like a tsunami wave, eventually reaching Robson and Thurlow. Here, a group of young men make their way up a telephone pole, one attempting to “walk the tightrope” across trolley bus lines. He plummets to the ground below, right into the crowd. Exasperating the situation, some fans begin to pull a Constable’s bike from beneath him. This isn’t a protest anymore, it’s a riot.
The Riot squad arrive shortly afterwards, hurling tear gas into the crowd. The panicked mob starts to destroy without reason, smashing windows at Eaton’s department store, stealing mannequins and dragging them through the streets, and lighting vehicles on fire.
Instead of leaving the scene, Mike dawns protective armor to shield himself from the gas. Clad head-to-toe in a gorilla suit he’d packed in preparation for such an occasion, he wanders around the scene, trying his best to avoid the police and the particularly violent rioters.
He makes his way through the carnage, but his outfit isn’t exactly covert. Somewhat expectedly, the rioters eventually notice the bipedal gorilla with a Canucks jersey and charge him. Mike runs for his life, his suit will be a perfect tinderbox for the particularly bloodthirsty amongst the crowd. He sprints towards 29th street station in a mad dash to freedom, and defying all odds, manages to catch the train, narrowly avoiding becoming the only fatality of the 1994 Stanley Cup riot. As he leaves the warzone, the loud sound of snapping echoes through Vancouver, as the plastic seats at the Coliseum are ripped apart.
Written by Noah Schmidt
Contact: nschmidt20@my.bcit.ca