Escorted

The avalanche that got me. Photo: Dave Thomas

March 17, 2009 – Kootenay Mountains, BC.

Just one swift kick and crack, the windslab was breaking away at my feet, sliding down the mountain beneath me. I had triggered an avalanche according to my precise plan, something I’ve done many many times before. I felt totally in control.

Less than a second later, I heard the sound of doom and felt the mountain side shake. The avalanche that I had triggered put enough force on the slope, that it caused a deeper layer to give way. I was standing on flat ground on bullet hard snow in a perfectly transitioned wind scoop about 2m downhill of a ridgeline – a place I thought would not avalanche.

When I felt the snow lurch, I spun my head and watched the snow crack apart behind me. I was standing still with my board in split mode and skins on. The avalanche fractured above me somewhere on the ridge. It had me.

I had one simple thought, “here I go”. For some reason, I remained calm. Perhaps it was because the snow was slow moving. Perhaps it was because, I knew someday this was going to happen.

I spotted a few small alpine fir trees poking out of the snow and a moment later I was within reaching distance. It seemed natural to extend my arm and hook one of the trees at my elbow, essentially putting it in a head lock. I figured I’d stop, I was not moving very fast. At that moment, the reality of my scene set in. I felt a strong pull at my feet. It was my splitboard catching blocks of snow flowing by. With all my strength I could not hold on. I was going down.

Every once in a while, we peer into the dark side of snowboarding. It is where we experience true fear.  This is not the same fear we feel in our guts before dropping into a committing line or trying a something new. My horror came when I realized that this is how my friend Craig died. Simply pulled down hill in a big hard slab avalanche with his splitboard as his anchor. Oh shit, not me, not now.

I now felt out of control, even though I wasn’t being thrown around. I could feel my split pulling me down hard and snow slamming into my back. In front of me was a giant pile of snow that had stopped and I thought I was going to get stuffed right into the base of it.  I screamed at the top of my lungs. Just before I hit the mound the avalanche stopped. I was buried to my stomach, my lower body locked into place.
I took a second or two to catch my breath.

Looking back up the mountain the fracture line looked like shark teeth. It was one of the oddest fracture lines, I had ever seen. The avalanche had pulled back onto the ridge, where the snow wildly varied in depth from 40cm to 200cm.

Slowly I learn about the mountains.