Deadly avalanches not uncommon in California mountains where skiers died | California
The avalanche that killed at least eight skiers in California’s Sierra Nevada mountains occurred in the Castle Peak area near Lake Tahoe, an area where fatal avalanches are not uncommon.
Sierra Avalanche CenterProviding forecasts for the region, the United States has observed at least 50 avalanches in the area near Lake Tahoe since September 2025. Map of places with the highest avalanche dangerThe risk is particularly high in the Lake Tahoe area right now.
As of Wednesday, the area ranks at four out of five on the North American Public Avalanche Hazard Scale, making it currently among the areas with the greatest avalanche risk in the United States.
In six of the last 10 years, people have died from avalanches in the Lake Tahoe area. A snowmobile recently was killed An avalanche occurred in the same area near Castle Peak earlier this year.
A backcountry tourist was killed on Powderhouse Peak in February last year, according to the Colorado avalanche information center.
In January 2024, two riders were caught in an avalanche on KT-22 in the Sierra Nevada, killing one rider. And in March 2021, a snowmobiler was killed in an avalanche near Frog Lake Cliffs north of Donner Pass.
Other deadly avalanches occurred in the region in 2020, 2018 and 2016.
Perhaps the most well-known avalanche to occur in the area is the Alpine Meadows avalanche in 1982.
That March, a wall of snow collapsed on the Alpine Meadows ski resort, killing seven people. Although the facility was closed due to weather conditions, four employees who remained at the facility were among those killed. The incident was memorialized in the movie Buried: The 1982 Alpine Meadows Avalanche and the book A Wall Of White by Jennifer Woodlief.
Avalanche fatalities are more likely to occur in mountainous areas rather than ski resorts. Last year, the Colorado avalanche information center recorded 19 backcountry avalanche deaths across the U.S. during the 2024-2025 ski season.
While avalanches are not uncommon in the Sierras, the death toll in Tuesday’s avalanche makes it one of the deadliest avalanches in U.S. history.
The deadliest avalanche in US history occurred in Wellington, Washington, in 1910; The avalanche dragged two passenger trains into a gorge, killing 96 people. The second deadliest occurred in 1898 in Chilkoot, Alaska, when snow slides killed approximately 65 people during the Klondike gold rush. The third highest death toll from an avalanche was recorded in 1981, when an avalanche on the Ingraham Glacier swept across Mount Rainer, killing 10 people.
Tuesday’s avalanche at Castle Peak was the fourth deadliest avalanche in U.S. history.
An avalanche can occur when fresh snow falls on an area where snowfall has already accumulated in an icy layer.
“When it snows, it is a fluffy crystalline structure. But when the temperature rises and the snow melts and begins to freeze again, the snow becomes more detailedNathalie Vriend, an associate professor of thermofluid sciences at the University of Colorado Boulder, wrote: in an article For conversation.
“This granular, icy snow is a weak layer. “When a new snow falls on top, the grains in the weak layer can be cut and create a surface on which the avalanche can slide.”
Tuesday’s avalanche resulted in a “permanent, weak layer” being covered by a “massive snow load,” Chris Feutrier, forester for the Tahoe national forest, said at a news conference Wednesday. He said that weak layer remained and filled again with a meter of snow.
