An avalanche at the Palisades Tahoe ski resort near Lake Tahoe in California killed one person and injured three others.
At about 9:30 a.m. local time Wednesday, the avalanche came crashing down on the Palisades side of the resort near the KT-22 chairlift, sweeping up four skiers, the resort said in a statement. Three of the skiers had non-life-threatening injuries and were released after being treated.
Kenneth Kidd, 66, died from unspecified fatal injuries, the Placer County Sheriff’s Office said in a Facebook post.
His death is the first avalanche-related fatality in the U.S. for 2024, according to the Colorado Avalanche Information Center, which monitors avalanches and related accidents nationwide.
One of the three survivors buried in the avalanche described what happened.
“The snow is already moving my feet, took me away and swept me off the mountain. I couldn’t pull myself up because the snow was so heavy on top of me. I was buried. … I’m lucky I had the face mask, I had some air in the face mask,” Janet He told KOVR-TV.
Ms. He was rescued by another skier, and she and husband Joseph Lu were able to walk down the mountain otherwise unharmed.
The mountain was closed Wednesday after the avalanche, and the area around the KT-22 chairlift remains closed Thursday due to avalanche-related debris blocking an access road, the resort said on its website.
The debris field is about 10 feet deep, 450 feet long and 150 feet wide, the sheriff’s office said.
The KT-22 run was used for the giant slalom during the 1960 Winter Olympics, Palisades Tahoe season pass holder Dan Lavely told The Associated Press.
The resort was then called Squaw Valley, a name it would bear until 2020 when it was changed following pressure from indigenous groups.
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