Following Wednesday’s confirmation that eight backcountry skiers perished and one person remains unaccounted for in an avalanche near Lake Tahoe, officials report this Northern California Sierra Nevada incident ranks among America’s most fatal snow disasters. The tragedy prompts a review of other catastrophic avalanches throughout U.S. history:
The nation’s deadliest snow disaster occurred when an enormous snow wall engulfed two Great Northern passenger trains, plunging them into a canyon and claiming 96 lives. The trains had been stranded on the railway for multiple days due to severe weather conditions, though some passengers who had walked to nearby towns were spared from the disaster.
During the height of the Klondike Gold Rush, a sequence of snow slides in April 1898 became the era’s most devastating tragedy, taking approximately 65 lives along the Chilkoot Trail.
Mount Rainier witnessed the nation’s most fatal climbing disaster when a tremendous ice avalanche struck the Ingraham Glacier, claiming the lives of ten climbers and their guide.
The community of Twin Lakes, located near Independence Pass, suffered a devastating blow when an avalanche destroyed multiple residences, resulting in seven fatalities that included five young children.
Alpine Meadows Ski Resort near Lake Tahoe experienced tragedy when an avalanche struck the facility, claiming seven lives, including four staff members who had stayed despite the resort’s closure due to hazardous conditions. Remarkably, a 22-year-old chairlift operator survived and was found five days later by a specially trained rescue dog in the ski chalet debris.
