A local Truckee man was killed Monday after being swept away in an inbounds avalanche while snowboarding at Donner Ski Ranch.
The Tahoe Daily Tribune reports that the Nevada County Sheriff’s Office received a report from a man around noon on Monday saying that a member of his group was missing and was feared to have been caught in an avalanche that occurred sometime around 9:30 a.m.
Search and rescue crews from neighboring resorts joined the search and the man’s body was eventually found under a few feet of snow at about 1:30 p.m. by a Sugar Bowl Ski Patrol dog.
“Search crews have just located the body of somebody,” Jakobs told The Union newspaper shortly before 2:30 p.m. Monday, the Tahoe Daily Tribune reports “All we are releasing is that the search teams have located the body of an individual. They are working to continue their search efforts.”
Also on Monday, a ski patroller at Alpine Meadows was air-lifted to Reno Monday morning after he was buried in an avalanche, a resort official said. The condition of the patroller is not known at this point.
“The avalanche was triggered by an explosive charge that had been thrown by a senior member of the ski patrol team,” a spokesman for Alpine said. “The patrol team members were positioned in an area that was, based on historical experience, believed to have been a protected area. The … avalanche broke much higher and wider on the slope than previously observed in past snow safety missions.”
More information on the slide at Alpine can be found at the Sierra Sun HERE.
Today’s incidents follow another inbounds avalanche yesterday at Squaw Valley that injured two people.