Eight people were killed in an avalanche during a backcountry skiing expedition on the California side of Lake Tahoe on Tuesday, authorities said in an update Wednesday.
One person is still missing but presumed dead, officials said, as searchers fight near-whiteout conditions. Six others in the party survived, ranging in age from 30 to 55 years old.
"We did have conversation with the families of the folks that are still outstanding and let them know that our mission went from a rescue to a recovery," Nevada County Sheriff Shannan Moon told reporters. "It’s a difficult conversation to have with loved ones."
The bodies of those killed remain at the scene, where significant avalanche risk persists.
"The risk is still as high with the mission moving to a recovery. We want to really make sure that our first response responders are safe," Moon said.
Placer County Sheriff Wayne Woo, whose deputies are assisting in the search, said it could be some time before all nine bodies can be recovered.
“We’re all so committed to seeing this through until the end,” Woo said. “At this point, I’m going to have to wait for, hopefully, a decent break in the weather and make sure we get every last soul off that mountain.”
The avalanche was about a football field in length, authorities said. It struck at about 11:30 a.m. Tuesday, sometime after the skiers had left a set of backcountry huts at Frog Lake, according to Blackbird Mountain Guides, which had four guides leading the trip. The skiers had been staying at the lake, which is northwest of Lake Tahoe and north of the Donner Summit, since Sunday.
“The group was in the process of returning to the trailhead at the conclusion of a three-day trip when the incident occurred,” Blackbird Mountain Guides said in a statement Tuesday.
The avalanche initially left nine unaccounted for. The sheriff’s office was able to remain in contact with the six survivors — one guide and five clients, according to Moon — via an emergency satellite messaging service that allowed them to send text messages.
Authorities sent a search-and-rescue team on skis into the area on Tuesday afternoon after receiving notice of the avalanche from Blackbird Mountain Guides and through the satellite messaging system.
The survivors took shelter in a treed area as they waited for hours for rescuers to traverse risky avalanche terrain in a whiteout to reach them.
Moon said the survivors found three bodies before rescuers reached them. Two survivors were injured and had to be transported out by rescue crews; the others were able to travel on their own with emergency responders. Two survivors were hospitalized, both with non-life-threatening injuries, and one has been released, according to Moon.
She said Blackbird Mountain Guides has assisted in the emergency response with search-and-rescue crews.
"They responded with us. They wanted to do everything that they could to assist," Moon said.
In mountain towns, backcountry skiers tend to form tight-knit communities, with significant crossover between powder aficionados, mountain guides and search-and-rescue crew members.
“One of the nine missing decedents is a spouse of one of our Tahoe Nordic search and rescue team members,” Woo said. "This has not only been challenging for our community, it’s been a challenging rescue, but it’s also been challenging emotionally for our team and our organization.”
Although the ski group was guided and prepared for the terrain, Moon said the snow and wind on Tuesday were dangerous and challenging to manage.
“Mother Nature does not seem to — it doesn’t seem to matter, right? No matter how prepared you are, no matter how experienced you are,” she said, when asked how to prevent disasters like this. “So recognizing it’s not just you, that you’re impacting the potential for resources getting deployed somewhere else.”
From Monday to Wednesday morning, about 30 inches of snow fell at the Tahoe Donner snow and weather station, which is roughly 4 miles from the avalanche site. The weather station is about 800 feet lower in elevation than the avalanche area, which means more snow likely fell where the slide took place.
An avalanche warning was in effect for the Tahoe region on Tuesday, with high risk at all aspects and any elevation.
“Natural avalanches are likely, and human-triggered avalanches large enough to bury or injure people are very likely,” the Sierra Avalanche Center wrote in its bulletin. “Avalanches could be triggered from very low on the slope in some areas.”
Forecasters were concerned that blizzard conditions could cause what's called a storm slab avalanche. That's when intense snowfall creates a consolidated layer of snow that does not bond to weaker layers below. The layer essentially shears off and cascades downslope in a matter of seconds.
In an initial report, the avalanche center said the slide occurred on a north-facing slope at an elevation of around 8,200 feet. The location is about a half-mile from the Frog Lake Backcountry Huts.
Avalanches typically happen in terrain with a slope angle between 30 and 45 degrees. The location the center provided is in low-angle terrain, which would have been considered safer for travel, though steep slopes loomed above.
In addition to satellite messaging devices, backcountry skiers typically carry safety gear, including avalanche beacons, shovels and probes, to help locate and rescue companions if necessary. Authorities said all the skiers involved in this incident were carrying beacons.
Although avalanches often cause physical trauma — head injuries, broken bones and torn ligaments — the biggest risk is suffocation during a burial longer than 15 to 20 minutes.
When the avalanche was first reported on Tuesday, 16 people were thought to be on the trip, but Moon said the number of skiers affected was revised down because one person had backed out of the expedition.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom commended the rescuers on Wednesday and offered condolences to the victims' families.
The United States had an average of 27 avalanche deaths each year over the past 10 years, according to the Colorado Avalanche Information Center. In recent history, the most deadly avalanche took place in Washington state in June 1981, when 11 climbers — one guide and 10 clients — were killed during an icefall avalanche on Mount Rainier, according to HistoryLink.
