Oregon Public Broadcasting

Rescue crews in southern British Columbia continue to search for eight snowmobilers who were buried by two avalanches Sunday.

Searchers describe the danger in the backcountry there as extreme. Avalanche conditions are also high in some of the mountainous areas south of the border. Correspondent Doug Nadvornick reports.

Kenny Kramer from the Northwest Avalanche Center in Seattle says the danger of big snow slides is high right now. He says the recent wet, heavy snow is sitting on an unstable base of drier snow that fell during the recent cold weather.

Kenny Kramer: “Sort of like piling bricks onto potato chips on a tilted coffee table. It just won’t support it.”

Kramer says that kind of snow is found mostly above 5000 feet throughout the Cascades and in the Olympics. That’s where the avalanche danger is highest.

He says Snoqualmie Pass is an exception. Rain and freezing rain there have stabilized the snow base, lowering the risk of slides.

Kramer urges skiers and snowmobilers to stay away from steep, backcountry areas in the high elevations and go instead to more gradual hills.

He says they might also consider heavily-forested areas where there is more protection from big slides.