Palisades Tahoe avalanche survivor describes being buried in snow
Jason Parker survived an avalanche. Photo: Interview with KCRA
TAHOE, Calif. - A 52-year-old man caught in the deadly avalanche at Palisades Tahoe said he reached a point where he thought he might not survive because he was buried in snow and was starting to lose consciousness.
Jason Parker told KCRA3 in an interview that a snowboarder named Luke and others on the mountain Wednesday morning saved his life. He estimates he was buried in snow for about eight minutes.
"And then the best thing ever happened," he told the Sacramento TV station, sounding very energetic and upbeat in a Zoom interview. "I felt this sensation, this probe just nail me right in the back, and I heard this person yell, ‘I found him’ or, ‘We got him.’ I kind of woke up rejuvenated."
Parker, who lives in Reno, Nev., is lucky.
Kenneth Kidd, 66, who had homes in Point Reyes and Truckee, ended up dying in that same wall of snow. The avalanche occurred about 9:30 a.m., just 30 minutes after the resort opened its KT-22 lift that carried the first skiers up to the highest expert-level black diamond slopes.
Officials said more than one hundred staff, first responders, and volunteers dug in the snow and surveyed the area trying to find survivors. The Placer County Sheriff's office said the avalanche debris area was about 150 feet wide and 450 feet long.
Rescuers say along with Kidd, they found three others buried in the avalanche. One had a leg injury, but all three were treated and released.
Parke and his fiancée knew that the KT-22 lift was going to open for the first time of the season and they were eager to take the first chair up the mountain.
He expected conditions to be windy with low visibility. Still, he and other locals on the lift line at 8:30 a.m. also expected a "fun day," he said.
He said after going back up the lift, he decided to check out the steep GS bowl area. As he skied down the mountain, he stopped and noticed some debris coming down. The wind had deposited a lot of snow near the chair lift.
Ten seconds later, he was hit with a first wave of snow that put him on his back.
He was flipped onto his belly and "going headfirst, trying to swim to the top."
He said that after getting through the gully he began to slow down and thought he would be OK. He estimates he was buried under six inches to a foot of snow at that point.
But then he got hit by another debris field, "and it just buried me so quick."
Parker told KCRA3 that made an air pocket by "punching a hole" that wasn’t sealed yet and began to scream for help.
He said he began to float into a dreamlike state and figured this was how he was going to die.
But that didn't happen.
A bunch of people he described as locals descended on his air pocket and dug him out. His fiancée was safe as she didn't get stuck in the snow.
"You can’t let your guard down when you’re in the mountains," he told KCRA3. "Looking back — a beacon would have been great. It gives that much more time for rescuers, if they have a transmitter, to find you."