Accident Report
Friday, January 14st,
2005
Dutch Draw – south of Canyons
Resort, Utah
Provisional report –
Updated 1-26-2005
We will update this report
as new information comes in
Location:
Dutch Draw is a backcountry
area south of Canyons Resort,
N 40° 39.214
W 111° 35.559
Photos:
http://www.avalanche.org/%7Euac/photos/Images04-05/Dutch_Draw_1-14-05/
Accident Summary:
A group of five
out-of-state snowboarders went to the Canyons Resort for the day and they rode
to the top of the Peak 9990. They saw
the nearby slopes of Dutch Draw with several dozen ski
and snowboard tracks in it and noticed several other parties hiking into the
area. Although most of the party members
had beacons and shovels in their cars, they did not bring them that day because
they did not plan to go into the backcountry.
Two of the party members had taken a level I avalanche class. The party
knew about the avalanche danger because they discussed it at length the
previous night. They decided to go into
the backcountry that day because it looked like a number of other people were
doing it without incident.
They hiked the 200 yards
to the top of Peak 9990 and left from the backcountry access gate, which is
clearly marked with several signs warning of the danger. To leave the boundary, one must push open a
gate with a large, white sign attached showing a skull
and crossbones marked in large letters “You May Die”. It is legal to access the backcountry, which
National Forest, but the Canyons Resorts wants to make sure everyone knows that
there is no avalanche control beyond their rope lines. They hiked south along the ridge about a half
mile to the top of Dutch Draw. On the
way, they passed one avalanche path that had dozens of tracks in it and they
went to the next path locally known as “Conehead”
because of its shape from a distance.
They hiked to the
They descended through the
island of trees and they planned to enter the slope from the side by passing
beneath a vertical cliff band. One snowboarderentered the slope below the cliff and Shane Maixner, 27, decided
to jump off the lower portion of the cliff onto the slope—a drop of about 20
feet. He appeared to trigger the
avalanche when he landed and he was engulfed in the slide. The first snowboarder managed to escape off
the nearby flank of the avalanche.
Rescue Summary:
The group of snowboarders
descended the avalanche bed surface and began probing with tree branches for
their friend. They also called 911 on
their cell phone and ski patrol from the Canyons Resort responded within about
20 minutes. After rescuers determined
that the party did not have beacons and that they did not get any beacon
signals from the rest of the debris, they decided that conditions were too
dangerous to put a larger group of rescuers onto the slope. They escorted the remaining four snowboarders
out of the area and Wasatch Powderbird Guides dropped
explosives onto the upper part of the avalanche path. They triggered the next slope to the north
with another large, hard slab avalanche, which was not quite as large as the
original slide, but they did not trigger any hangfire
above the original avalanche.
The Summit County Sheriff
took over the rescue and brought in a larger team from the Summit County Search
and Rescue along with personnel from Wasatch Backcountry Rescue. They used avalanche rescue dogs and probes. They finally found the body of Shane Maixner two days after the accident, buried four feet deep
in a grove of trees on the extreme north edge of the avalanche path.
It proved very difficult
to know how many people were caught in the slide because of widely conflicting
witness accounts. The original party of
snowboarders reported that they believed that they were alone in the bowl. They did not notice any one else. Three other parties, however, reported other
people in the bowl. First, a party at
the top of the slope was video taping the scenery from the ridge when they
heard the roar of the avalanche. When
they looked over the edge and continued to video the slide. The tape, reportedly, was of poor quality and
inconclusive about other parties in the bowl.
Second, two snowboarders were building jumps on the flats below just to
the north of the avalanche runout and they were
adamant that they saw others on the slope and were able to give descriptions of
clothing and exact locations. Third, a
party hiking up to the backcountry access point from the top of the 9990 lift
claimed to see a lone skier going across the flats at the bottom, who was
overcome by the slide.
Since many of the people
who ski at the Canyons Resort are on vacation, it was very difficult to know
who was missing at the end of the day.
In fact, it took until January 17th—three days after the
accident, to whittle the list down. The
Summit County Sheriff announced that there was likely only one fatality and he
called off the search.
Media interest was intense
because the some witnesses to the avalanche initially indicated that there may
have been 15 people buried. On the heels
of the large mudslides in
Avalanche Data:
The avalanche was a very
large, hard-slab avalanche composed of very dense, heavy snow that fell from
around Christmas to January 11th.
It was the largest avalanche most avalanche professionals have ever seen
in that path. The fracture depth of the avalanche was 6-8 feet deep and 600
feet wide. It slid on an east-northeast
facing slope with the upper fracture just under 10,000’ and the avalanche descended
about 1000 vertical feet. The slope
steepness was 39 degrees at the trigger point and the rest of the starting zone
ranged from 35-45 degrees in steepness.
The runnout angle of the avalanche was 19-20
degrees, depending on which part of the crown face from which it was measured. The avalanche fractured on a weak layer of
faceted snow, which formed during clear weather in December and in places, it
stepped down deeper to faceted snow, which formed in November. (Faceted snow is
formed from large temperature gradients within the snow pack. In this case, the large temperature gradients
formed within the surface snow. Clear
skies allowed for intense cooling of the snow surface because the snow surface
radiates its heat away into a clear sky.)
Weather History:
Media Reports:
This accident captured the
national media attention and numerous articles appeared in many of the nations newspapers as well as being headline news on most of
the national television stations. There
are far too many article to include here, but this is
a sample of an article as the search came to a close.
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Article
Last Updated: 1/18/2005 12:18 AM |
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Sheriff:
Only 1 slide death |
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Search
for more avalanche victims is called off |
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By Lisa
Rosetta |
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