The identities of three ski guides killed in the catastrophic Lake Tahoe-area avalanche were revealed by authorities during an emotional press conference Saturday.
Officials somberly read the names of Michael Henry, 30, Andrew Alissandratos, 34, and Nicole Choo, 42 — all employees of Blackbird Mountain Guides — as the final victims of the tragic snow slide Tuesday at Castle Peak.
Nicole Choo, 42.Instagram/@nikichoochoo
Andrew Alissandratos, 34.
Michael Henry, 30.
All nine victims, including six “supermoms” who were clients of Blackbird, were recovered from the mountain on Friday and Saturday.
“There are no words that truly capture the significance of this loss and our hearts mourn alongside the families of those affected by this catastrophic event,” said Nevada County Sheriff Shannan Moon. “The weight of this event is felt across many families, friends, and colleagues, and we stand together with them during this difficult time.”
The California Highway Patrol airlifted out five bodies on Friday, including a missing skier who was presumed dead.
The final victim was found near the others, who were located days earlier, but a search team initially failed to see the skier due to white-out conditions.
CHP retrieved an additional body on Saturday, before high winds forced the National Guard to fly in a BlackHawk helicopter to recover the final three.
Recovery efforts took several days due to extreme weather in the area and unstable snow on the mountain, authorities said.
Search teams got assistance from the utility company PG&E, which used water drops to break up the snow and make entry less dangerous. Authorities described the avalanche as roughly the size of a football field.
The six other victims had been previously identified as Katherine Vitt, 43, Carrie Atkin, 46, Danielle Keatley, 44, Kate Morse, 45, and sisters Caroline Sekar, 45, and Liz Clabaugh, 52.
Katherine Vitt, 43.X@gvitt
Carrie Atkin, 46.Facebook/Carrie Atkin
“They were all mothers, wives and friends, all of whom connected through the love of the outdoors,” read a statement from the women’s families. “They were passionate, skilled skiers who cherished time together in the mountains. They lived in the Bay Area, Idaho, and the Truckee-Tahoe region.”
Six skiers survived the horrifying ordeal, which began when a group of 15 trekked into the Sierra Nevadas Sunday for the backcountry adventure.
Blackbird Mountain Guides now faces a criminal investigation, after warning only a day prior of a “BIG storm” in a social media post that featured one of its guides sifting through a weak layer of snow that “could lead to some unpredictable avalanches!”
“Those are the decisions that the guide company clearly had made,” Moon said after the tragedy. “We’re still in conversation with them on the decision factors that they made.”
Caroline Sekar, 45 (left) and her sister Liz Clabaugh, 52.
In a statement, Blackbird founder Zeb Blais said all of the guides were trained or certified in backcountry skiing by the American Mountain Guides Association, and each was an instructor with the American Institute for Avalanche Research and Education.
“In addition, guides in the field are in communication with senior guides at our base, to discuss conditions and routing based upon conditions,” the statement read. “There is still a lot that we’re learning about what happened. It’s too soon to draw conclusions, but investigations are underway.”
The ski group reportedly took the most dangerous route to escape the mountain, choosing a “complex” 60-degree incline that was given the second highest rating on the avalanche risk scale.
There was a longer, flatter route with the second lowest threat of snow slides that the group could have taken.
Danielle Keatley, 44.Facebook/John Gray Writer
Kate Morse, 45.AP
The survivors — none of whom have been identified — tried to dig their friends out of the deep snow after the avalanche struck. The group managed to pull three victims out of the snow pack, but they did not survive.
The six who managed to survive used tarps as makeshift shelters, setting off emergency beacons and alerting first responders using the iPhone’s SOS feature.
Blais, who founded the Truckee, Calif.-based guiding company in 2020 and has been a mountain guide for more than two decades, is no stranger to disaster.
In 2021, he recounted getting caught in an avalanche in Tajikistan after he and his team grew “impatient” crossing a glacier they knew had “unstable” snow.
Blais said his group exhibited poor judgement and called it “one of the biggest learning experiences of my career,” after snow buried the thrill-seeker and he needed to be rescued.
“I don’t care where you are, you just don’t want to get caught in a real avalanche. Yeah it was for me, it was a huge shift, and just like, yeah, this can happen to you,” he said.