Mar. 5—Multiple people who were heli-skiing Tuesday afternoon near Girdwood were caught in an avalanche and weren’t able to be immediately recovered, Alaska State Troopers said.
The agency received a report of the avalanche late Tuesday afternoon, troopers spokesman Austin McDaniel said.
“The company that they were skiing with attempted to recover the skiers but were unable to due to the depth of the snow,” McDaniel said.
“Multiple individuals” were caught in the slide, which occurred near the west fork of Twentymile River, according to McDaniel.
How many people may have been involved and which heli-ski operator they were skiing with wasn’t immediately clear, among other details surrounding the incident.
Troopers will try to reach the avalanche site on Wednesday, McDaniel said.
The Chugach National Forest Avalanche Information Center — which includes the Girdwood and Portage areas in its broader Turnagain Pass zone for avalanche forecasting — in recent days has described a weak layer of snow buried up to 2 feet deep that was “tricky to assess” and that posed a risk to backcountry recreators across the region.
On Tuesday morning, the center said avalanche danger was “considerable” at mid- and upper elevations, indicating that natural slides were possible, and human-triggered avalanches likely.
This is a developing story. Check back for updates.
