Incredible wildlife sighting out of Hemis National Park in northern India of a snow leopard triggering an avalanche. Named after the 400-year-old Buddhist monastery, the park was founded in 1981 and is home to more than 200 snow leopards who thrive in it’s high altitude terrain.
The video was taken following a blizzard that buried the region in a deep powder snow. A group of tourists lead by Voygr Expeditions spotted the elusive big cat trudging through the unstable snowpack on a steep mountainside deep in the Himalayas. If you watch closely you can see the snow leopard react to the slide almost before it happens, turning around on a dime as the slightest hint of a fracture appears.
Truly a remarkable reaction time by an animal who has evolved over the eons to survive in the inhospitable environments of the world’s tallest mountain range.
Known as the “ghost of the mountains” snow leopards live in some of the harshest places on earth where they blend into their surroundings thanks to their gray and white fur spotted with large black rosettes which acts as perfect natural camouflage rendering them virtually invisible to the untrained eye. To see one out in the wild incredibly rare and privileged. To see one triggering an avalanche is beyond lucky.
