In Just 10 Seconds: T3rrified Avalanche Survivors Reveal the Critical Moments Before Nine People Were Bur!ed

Two of the survivors of last week’s deadly avalanche near Castle Peak in the Sierra Nevada Mountains have now spoken out about the group’s decision to venture out in blizzard conditions.

An option to stay behind at the Frog Lake Backcountry Ski Huts and hunker down there until conditions improved was apparently not discussed with the 11 clients on a backcountry ski expedition on February 17. One who survived the deadly avalanche that would befall the group, Anton Auzans, tells the New York Times, “I didn’t say anything. I’m not an expert and so I decided to trust the plan.”

Auzans, 37, and fellow survivor Jim Hamilton, 65, gave interviews to the Times, while two women and one man who survived the ordeal have declined to speak to the press and the other survivor — who was one of four guides on the trip with Blackbird Mountain Guides — has not been reached for comment.

It seems as though the guide group likely plans trips for groups of four to eight, and in this case they had one group of eight women who were together, and second group of three men, including Auzans and Hamilton — one person had reportedly canceled their trip — and each group had two guides with them. The two groups joined together for the trek out last Tuesday.

Questions have swirled in the last 10 days about what was discussed and how it was decided that the group of 15 would ski out when they did, at 11:30 am, in blizzard conditions when a rising avalanche risk had been widely publicized.

Hamilton, and an unidentified guide who stayed with him, lagged well behind the rest of the group because of a ski binding that refused to latch on to his ski. Per the Times, he was cursing his bad luck and following the line of ski tracks ahead of them when those tracks abruptly ended.

Hamilton had been far enough behind that had not heard anyone shout “Avalanche!” and had not seen the snow slide until he came upon it. He then reportedly heard Auzans, who had just met two days earlier when they joined this trip together, shout out, “Major avalanche! Major avalanche! We have people buried!”

Auzans, who was just a short distance behind the bulk of the group, had seen the avalanche hit and tookcover behind a tree before he was also carried by a wave of snow into a clearing. He describes to the Times seeing “a wall of white dotted with strange blurs of color,” those blurs being the skis and clothing of his fellow skiers who were being carried away in the avalanche.

Auzans describes trying to dig out a fellow survivor, and how the powdery snow they had been skiing had, in the slide, become as heavy and thick as cement.

The men describe helping to dig out two women who they found still breathing under the snow, and how after an hour of searching, they decided to give up on looking for anyone else — knowing that their chances of survival under the snow was likely low — and to focus on the two they had found alive. They, along with one other ski client and the guide, sheltered under a tarp for more than five hours as the rescuers made their way to the remote location.

Hamilton tells the Times that the skiing on Monday had been incredible, and all seemed very safe. “It was everything you thought it would be. Just epic. And I never once felt like we were in danger,” he tells the paper. “I remember watching the women fly by me and they are having a blast.”

But as the snow became more intense Tuesday morning, the survivors say that a decision was made to skip a planned ski lap and head directly back to the trailhead they had come in on, albeit by a slightly altered route to avoid some avalanche danger.

“We have to get out of here now,” the guides reportedly told the group, per Auzans.

The guides reportedly discussed several routes, and apparently ruled out two much safer but longer routes out of the backcountry that would have left the clients far from their cars.

They avoided Frog Lake Notch, which they had used to come in two days earlier, deeming it too dangerous.

The route out required trudging uphil through hip-deep snow, and the guides reportedly would go ahead to try to pack down a trail for the others to follow. It took over an hour to less than a half mile, reportedly.

Once they reached a peak, the group put skis on skied through the powder to a valley beneath Perry’s Peak, which is where tragedy would ultimately strike. Hamilton says he struggled skiing through deep powder and fell, but described the group of eight women, friends and veteran powder skiers, all doing it effortlessly ahead of him.

The slope they were ultimately on, climbing up a short way toward a trail, was apparently not dangerous on its own. At just 20 degrees, it was not steep enough to be considered avalanche terrain. But the avalanche was triggered, possibly by wind, high above them on the steeper Perry’s Peak, and the unstable snow came rushing down it carrying everything in its path.

Auzans was actually buried, and felt like his hands were packed too tightly to move, he tells the Times. But, “Trapped in the snow, Mr. Auzan thought about his 3-year-old son and never seeing him again. He said a rage built up inside him and gave him the strength to push his hands free. Suddenly, he was looking at daylight.”

Auzans had training enough to know that surviving an avalanche comes down to the first 20 minutes, and he, Hamilton, and the surviving guide all went about digging frantically after it became clear everyone else was under the snow.

Hamilton shot several photos that he shared with Times of the makeshift shelter where they waited for help, and the snow-filled and tree-filled area where they were stuck. And the Times also has a series of labeled photos of the terrain around Frog Lake and Perry’s Peak, illustrating exactly where the avalanche occurred.

More details about the guides’ discussion and the route they chose is likely to be the subject of legal filings for years to come.