Avalanches caught and carried six people between Vail Pass and Rocky Mountain National Park this past weekend. One person was injured. Another was pinned against a tree.
On Saturday, Jan. 10, two people were caught in one slide on a southeast aspect at Haiyaha Couloir in RMNP. Video from the incident, shared by Colorado Avalanche Information Center, shows one snowboarder being swept away by an avalanche. A second slide is released when the victim’s partner tries to help.
The first victim at RMNP dislocated a shoulder trying to self-arrest. There were no other injuries. The slide broke up to 14 inches deep and ran several hundred feet downhill.
In their online report the travelers admit they had a plan but did not follow it precisely when they began leapfrogging each other into the slide zone.
“We knew the terrain, we knew the conditions, we had a plan,” the travelers wrote. “We deviated with the leapfrog.”
On Friday, Jan. 9, a pair of backcountry snowboarders was riding East Vail when a slide broke on an easterly aspect. The victim was carried and pinned against a tree. Although she was uninjured, her partner had to go back uphill to help her escape. This slide broke up to 24 inches deep and ran an estimated 1,000 feet.
“There were no signs of cracking beforehand, but we knew it was not totally stable,” the travelers wrote. “We were extremely lucky to be mostly okay after such a large avalanche.”
Through the rest of the weekend three smaller slides took people on brief rides, including one just north of Arapahoe Basin, a second east of the Eisenhower-Johnson Tunnels near Mount Trelease, and a third on Jones Pass west of Berthoud Pass.
In three of these five incidents the avalanches broke in windloaded snow a few inches deep. The East Vail slide was reported as persistent slab.
Preview images via CAIC.
