DENVER — Just one week ago, the warning from the Colorado Avalanche Information Center (CAIC) was crystal clear: Expect extremely dangerous avalanche conditions across the high country.
Denver7 shared this alert and CAIC's recommendation to avoid all avalanche terrain last week. Now, we are following up with CAIC to see what happened through the past week.
Over the last seven days, CAIC's warning played out in real time with a total of 425 avalanches across the state.
"Having 400 avalanches in a week, especially given the size of the avalanches that we've been seeing, I would say is unusual," said Ethan Greene, director of the CAIC.
At least seven people were caught in some of those avalanches.
The first was on Valentine's Day when a driver in a pickup was pushed off the side of the road on Loveland Pass. The driver, Vu Nguyen, spoke with Denver7 about regaining consciousness in the upside down truck, crawling through a window and how strangers helped him to safety.
"I don't remember their faces, but I would never forget that act of kindness," he told us.
CAIC will release a final report on that avalanche at a later time.
"They had closed the road and were trying to sweep the public, to get folks off of the highway and onto the open roads," Greene explained. "That process, because of the weather and the traffic, was taking a while. And so unfortunately, that's what led to that accident."
Since then, crews have been intermittently closing Interstate 70 throughout the week to trigger avalanches so the risk is gone by the time drivers are on the roads.
Watch CDOT's video of a controlled avalanche on I-70 near Silver Plume from Wednesday in the video below. Traffic was stopped as a safety precaution.
"We've done a lot of work, and we've had pretty good results," Greene said. "We're optimistic and continuing to monitor the conditions as we head into the weekend."
While Greene said it's unlikely to get stuck as a driver in an avalanche because of the mitigation work, there are things you can do to stay safe.
"You should stay in your vehicle. Call 911, or local dispatch center, let them know what's going on, so that we can get assistance over to you. You're much safer in your vehicle if there's an avalanche," he said.
Rescue crews were busy this week as well.
The Summit County Rescue Group released video of them digging out a buried backcountry snowmobiler who had been caught under an avalanche for more than an hour on Shrine Mountain, which is west of Vail Pass.
You can watch the rescue video in the player below. Note, there is no audio on the video.
Rescue crews were able to save that snowmobiler.
Unfortunately, an avalanche west of Silverton on Thursday resulted in the second death of the season. A backcountry skier and snowboarder were both caught in an avalanche in the Middle Fork of Mineral Creek drainage in an area known locally as "The Nose."
Silverton Medical Rescue has identified the snowboarder who was killed as a 41-year-old woman from Crested Butte.
The first avalanche-related death of the season happened in early January, when a skier was caught in a slide on Red Mountain Pass.
With tons of fresh snow in the high country over the week and sunny skies forecasted for the weekend, it's expected to be a busy next few days for skiers who should be keeping an eye on the changing hazards.
"We can see a lot of avalanche activity when we have direct sunshine, especially this type of year on... that really light and fluffy snow that we all know and love," Greene said. "We have a myriad of problems in the snowpack right now, and so that's why the important thing for people to do is to check the avalanche forecast if they're heading into the backcountry."
Much of Colorado's mountains at and above treeline are under "considerable" danger, which ranks as 3 out of 5 on CAIC's dangerous avalanche scale. The most dangerous slopes are at upper elevations facing northeast, east and southeast. Observers have seen a growing number of avalanches that broke across entire terrain features, "growing nearly unsurvivable in size," CAIC reported.
"Avalanche conditions are ripe for an accident in almost every way," CAIC's forecast reads. "A long dry spell tested everyone's patience while we dealt with brutal snow conditions for almost all types of winter backcountry recreation. Snow returned with a vengeance with a notable atmospheric river event last week and now we have a thick, cohesive slab on top of some very well-developed persistent weak layers. Combine an impatient and eager population of winter backcountry recreationists with dangerous avalanche conditions where you probably won't see any signs of instability before triggering a large to very large avalanche and you have the perfect recipe for an avalanche accident."
CAIC warned that this is not the time to navigate anywhere near steep slopes, but instead, it "is the time to take a big step back and enjoy some low-angle snow. Watch out for each other out there."
Always check CAIC's website for avalanche conditions and forecasts before heading out. Bring essential gear, which includes an avalanche transceiver, a shovel and a probe, and understand how to use them.
Colorado's 2024-2025 avalanche season has seen 47 incidents so far where at least one person was caught.
The combination of Valentine's Day weekend and Presidents Day weekend is typically "one of the busiest — and deadliest — times of the season," CAIC said on Feb. 14. More than one-third of all avalanche fatalities in February occur Feb. 14, 15 and 16, and February is the deadliest overall month for avalanches in the state.
"You're always going to be much, much safer if you're traveling with companions who also carry that gear and know how to use it," Brian Lazar, deputy director of CAIC, told Denver7 on Feb. 14.
