California avalanche buries group of skiers; kills eight

A 15-person skiing party went missing on Tuesday after an avalanche in the Sierra Nevada region of Northern California, according to local officials. Search and rescue teams located six survivors late Tuesday night, and located eight more skiers deceased on Wednesday,  Nevada County Sheriff Shannan Moon said at a Wednesday news conference.  Search teams continue looking for the final skier, but in a recovery capacity, not rescue, Moon said. 

WORLD reached out to the Nevada County Sheriff’s office on Wednesday morning for additional updates and did not receive an immediate response. The avalanche occurred around 11:30 a.m. local time on Tuesday at Castle Peak, a mountain in California’s Sierra Nevada range near Donner Pass and the Nevada state border. The party included four guides and 11 ski guests, with nine women and six men, Moon said. The initial rescue took several hours due to extreme weather conditions.  Survivors included five women and one man, ranging from 30 to 55 years old, Moon said. 

How were the survivors found?  About 46 first responders headed up initial search and rescue efforts, including highly skilled ski rescue teams and a tracked, over-the-snow vehicle. Teams located the six survivors after receiving an iPhone’s SOS feature that allowed the skiers to communicate directly with first responders. The six survivors also located three of the deceased while waiting for rescue teams, Moon said. Two of the six survivors were injured and were unable to walk to the rescue team’s snowmobile, but they managed to make the 2-mile journey back to the vehicle and off the mountain, Moon said. One of the injured remained hospitalized, while the other was treated and released Tuesday night, she added. 

Dig deeper: Read Elias Ferenczy’s 2023 report on a world-champion American skier dying in an avalanche while skiing in Japan.