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Another Avalanche 3/3/18

RIP, very sad to hear, just met these guys over in cooke a few weeks ago
 
I was with them in Cooke. 2 friends of mine. Another story that sounds like it started with very poor decisions :face-icon-small-sad The backcountry is very real people. It's not a game and avalanche gear doesn't make you bullet proof. It tears me apart that I have lost multiple friends now in just over a year that the decisions made were probably the biggest factor in the accident...
 
leader

been in that area many times a super fun zone.
chutes ect with gravy and fordy and many others.


I WOULD LIKE TO THANK MY HERO AND GUIDE FRIEND FOR KEEPING US SAFE FOR ALL THESE YEARS.


god bless those involved.


Chit can happen no matter how prepared.


one of my favorite areas.... hits hard to the heart.
fricken tears
 
I was with them in Cooke. 2 friends of mine. Another story that sounds like it started with very poor decisions :face-icon-small-sad The backcountry is very real people. It's not a game and avalanche gear doesn't make you bullet proof. It tears me apart that I have lost multiple friends now in just over a year that the decisions made were probably the biggest factor in the accident...

Sorry for your loss.
 
Anybody know exactly where this happened? I'm pretty familiar with that zone and all I can think of is that face you can climb up with the big cliff at the top (opposite of the climb to Lake Ann), or the climb toward Chaincase from the Teanaway side. I was skiing the peak at Van Epps Pass and from the top I could see all of the peaks in the area, and no sign of avys anywhere. Can't see the Esmeraldas from there, but Lake Ann and vicinity was solid, as was the back bowls of Van Epps. Somebody had ridden all over back there on very committing faces, again, with no avy signs whatsoever. Seems like this might have been a very localized instability, which is a hidden danger that could catch anybody.
 
I was with them in Cooke. 2 friends of mine. Another story that sounds like it started with very poor decisions :face-icon-small-sad The backcountry is very real people. It's not a game and avalanche gear doesn't make you bullet proof. It tears me apart that I have lost multiple friends now in just over a year that the decisions made were probably the biggest factor in the accident...

with all due respect to the deceased...would you mind sharing the details (obviously leave out names of who did what), but I think it's important to talk about the details on what caused the slide...so we can all learn from it and hope prevent these in the future
 
Jeremy Bigford aka 1500psi sent me this to post:
"Conditions we low to moderate yesterday. I talked to Kyle everyday this week about avys and he knows what he’s doing. He’s grown up with the some of the best backcountry riders there is. They were at this spot for over 2.5 hours. It was a massive slide. Everyone had bags deployed and all the gear. James was buried way down like 15’ with a bag on and deployed. He was a bonney lake cop for 14 years. Zach had a bca 32 pack on and it COMPLETELY ripped the air bag off the AVY pack and he was buried and down a few feet with the empty avy pack attached to him and Ryan got him out fast and gave him cpr for awhile but he was dead. Kyle was air lifted to harborview with a life threatening leg injury. He had immediate surgery last night to save his leg hopefully. His veins were smashed into his shattered leg bones and bleeding into his muscle. He’s full of pins and rods and has vacuum sponges in him right now to relieve swelling. His knee is destroyed. He was buried with his leg completely sideways at the knee 90* wrapped around a tree the wrong direction when he was unburied. More surgeries to come."

I've been in McCall so I have yet to see Kyle. Jeremy has so I would say this is pretty solid information.
 
Anybody know exactly where this happened? I'm pretty familiar with that zone and all I can think of is that face you can climb up with the big cliff at the top (opposite of the climb to Lake Ann), or the climb toward Chaincase from the Teanaway side. I was skiing the peak at Van Epps Pass and from the top I could see all of the peaks in the area, and no sign of avys anywhere. Can't see the Esmeraldas from there, but Lake Ann and vicinity was solid, as was the back bowls of Van Epps. Somebody had ridden all over back there on very committing faces, again, with no avy signs whatsoever. Seems like this might have been a very localized instability, which is a hidden danger that could catch anybody.



I don’t have the exact location. But I know it was approximately 1/2 mile from the turnaround/restroom at Esmaralda.


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