Questioning the backcountry

Had a scary experience skiing the other day. I was in bounds, skiing with a good friend. 48 hours and 45+ inches of snow were laying thick on the trails. Nothing out of the ordinary from any of the thousands of previous days on snow, always trying to find the freshest snow/steepest slopes as the snow was heavy enough that anything even remotely flattish would stop you completely.

Nic headed across the trail towards the lift, I followed. Once again, nothing out of the ordinary, and nothing I’ve not done hundreds of thousands of times…

Suddenly ski tips dive and launch me forward. I go into the snow head first and torpedo under. Skis stay on as we weren’t going fast, left arm is pinned down, left leg can’t move and is pinned under the snow. My head and face are buried and I can’t even see the light of day. Normally with Utah snow it’s not hard to wriggle your way out and get clear of the snow, this stuff is different. Water content is twice what it normally would be for mid-winter Utah snow and it sets up hard around me. My right hand is free so I start to try to dig out my face and get a clear area to breath, but the snow is firm and I’m obviously deeper than I originally expected. Digging hard and I’m starting to see a bit of light coming through the snow but I’ve been under for over a minute now and am really starting to freak out…

Somebody saw me fall, and saw me struggle, stopped and came to dig me out. I still don’t know who they were but I’m thankful they were there. They get my face clear and call for patrol. Once patrol comes over the pair finish digging me out and drag me out of the remnants of snow around me. I had gone about 2.5-3 feet under at my head and left side was deeper.

This was not an avalanche, it was not avalanche debris, and I can’t imagine being in that. Nor do I want to…

A number of my friends and I do a fair amount of backcountry touring/sidecountry riding/traverse way the hell out to the ends of the inbounds area in search of fresh snow. I love skiing, been doing it for many many moons now and have no intention of giving it up. I love powder, deep untracked powder, but to say that I’m still gunshy would be an understatement…

I’ve had a bit of avalanche training so I know what to avoid, and don’t even think of going out anywhere if the daily avy report is anything over low or moderate on the aspects that I’ll be skiing, with friends, all with the proper rescue equipment (beacon, shovel, probe, and a brain for those who don’t know.)

That said I’m still questioning things even harder than normally since the in-bounds freakout. Funny part is that it wasn’t out of bounds, and my partners pay way more attention to each other when in any sort of area that would not benefit from avalanche control work/ski patrol, so my issues are less with the backcountry terrain but even so it’s just unnerving.

Anyway, the Wasatch needs way more snow anyway…this year’s snow goddess has been shy. Come on out and play…