The storm that blew into the Sierra Nevada earlier this week was ferocious, bringing frigid air, gusts of wind and whiteouts and dropping 6 feet of new snow on Donner Summit in a matter of days. Weather forecasters predicted the storm well in advance, and it came as expected. The heightened avalanche danger during the storm was also known. On Tuesday, Sierra Avalanche Center’s forecasters issued their daily forecast, which predicted high avalanche danger: “Widespread areas of unstable snow and numerous avalanches are expected today,” reads the first line of the report.

There were no surprises about the size and impact of this week’s storm. And that’s exactly why no one expected such a massive and heart-wrenching tragedy to occur in the middle of it.

Late Tuesday morning, during the worst of the storm, an avalanche struck a group of 15 backcountry skiers who were on their way home from the Frog Lake Backcountry Huts, near Castle Peak. The avalanche was about the size of a football field, said Chris Feutrier, supervisor of the Tahoe National Forest, in a press conference Wednesday. 

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Eight people died and one more remains missing and is presumed deceased, making it the deadliest avalanche in the United States since 1981. It occurred about a mile away from another avalanche that killed a snowmobiler in January. 

A staff member for the Sierra Avalanche Center digs into the snow to study the layers on Tuesday, Feb. 17, 2026.

Beyond the sheer scale of the loss — all those lives — Tuesday’s avalanche is difficult to comprehend for other, simpler reasons that don’t add up. This group had experience. They were skilled backcountry skiers. They hired guides from a respected company who were trained with the highest certifications for mountain guiding and avalanche education and knew this area well. There was shelter; even amid high avalanche danger, the Frog Lake Backcountry Huts are a safe haven, a place to wait out such a storm. It’s also common practice to travel in smaller groups in the backcountry, spacing out skiers and keeping eyes on one another, specifically so that if an avalanche occurs, those who were not in the slide path can act quickly and launch  a rescue.

Don't let Google decide who you trust.

So why did this group venture out in this storm? And how did so many people die? 

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There are no straightforward answers, at least not yet. The California Division of Occupational Safety and Health, or Cal/OSHA, has launched an investigation into the guiding company, Blackbird Mountain Guides, and the avalanche. But even after officials have investigated and conclusions have been made, it’s unlikely we’ll ever make sense of such a sickening event. 

And so we’re left with a shock wave barreling through communities in Truckee, Lake Tahoe and the Bay Area, where many of these women lived when they were not spending time in the mountains. Three guides are also among the dead and missing. The families of six of the women killed came forward with a group statement on Thursday evening. According to the statement, they were mothers, wives, athletes and a part of a group of eight close friends who’d made longtime plans for this trip to the Frog Lake huts. 

Snow-covered trees on a hillside during a snowfall in Truckee, Calif., on Feb. 18, 2026.

Vehicles drive down California state Route 28 in near-whiteout conditions in Kings Beach, Calif., on Feb. 19, 2026.

“They were experienced backcountry skiers who deeply respected the mountains,” the statement said. “They were trained and prepared for backcountry travel and trusted their professional guides on this trip. They were fully equipped with avalanche safety equipment.” 

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One common refrain among avalanche education instructors is that backcountry skiers and avalanches typically like the same terrain, said David Reichel, executive director for the Sierra Avalanche Center. He added: “When we head into the backcountry, we’re often looking for good soft snow on steep terrain that is avalanche terrain,” explaining that avalanche terrain is technically defined as a slope between 30 and 45 degrees, which is about as steep as an intermediate ski slope.

There are ways to lower the risk you take in the backcountry. Many backcountry skiers are trained to identify warning signs with the goal of being prepared to make the decision that will avoid an avalanche, because you can never eliminate avalanche risk altogether.

“Usually when avalanche accidents are investigated, it is found that not just one or two clues were overlooked or ignored but three, or four, or five clues by the time the group got into trouble,” wrote authors and avalanche experts Jill Fredston and Doug Fesler in “Snow Sense: A guide to evaluating snow avalanche hazard,” a slim book published in 1994 that’s become a mandatory read for backcountry skiers. One problem, the book goes on to say, is that those clues aren’t obvious. There is no flashing billboard. The snowpack is unlike the ocean; you can’t look up and see a giant wave approaching. 

Trees silhouette the snow-covered peaks around Lake Tahoe after a snowfall viewed from Kings Beach, Calif., on Feb. 20, 2026.

A motorist digs their car out of a snowbank on California state Route 28 during a heavy snowfall in Kings Beach, Calif., on Feb. 19, 2026.

A snowstorm slamming Lake Tahoe in Kings Beach, Calif., on Feb. 17, 2026.

If you know what to look for, though, nature provides plenty of information. Often, people fall into what psychologists call heuristic traps: mental shortcuts in decision-making that can put people in danger in the backcountry. For example, according to avalanche expert Ian McCammon, who identified a set of “human factors” that often lead to avalanche accidents, people tend to get complacent in familiar terrain, and group dynamics hold enormous power over decision-making. According to McCammon, larger groups of people are often emboldened to make riskier decisions, especially when experts are in the group.

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A visit to a refuge in a rugged landscape turns deadly

For nearly a century, the swath of land surrounding Frog Lake was privately owned and inaccessible to the public. But in 2020, the Truckee Donner Land Trust acquired Frog Lake in a 3,000-acre conservation deal on Donner Summit and unlocked some of the most idyllic and rugged backcountry terrain in the Tahoe region. 

Now, the Frog Lake Backcountry Huts are one of Tahoe’s most sought-after backcountry destinations. The huts provide sleeping accommodations, hot water and toilets, with access to a commercial kitchen in a renovated stone lodge. Just beyond the doorstep lies some of the best backcountry ski terrain in the Tahoe region. They sit in a row near the lake, beneath a 1,000-foot-high cliff, in the middle of a vast and forested landscape. Reservations are typically booked solid months in advance.

There are no roads to get to the huts. In the summer, they’re accessible by foot or bike. Come winter, skiers and snowboarders can take multiple routes, but all require passing through avalanche terrain, something the land trust reiterates multiple times on its website.

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The land trust declined an interview request for this article but provided the following statement: “The avalanche that occurred on February 17 near Castle Peak weighs heavily on our close-knit community, and the parties involved, their loved ones, and their friends are in the thoughts of the Truckee Donner Land Trust’s staff and board.”

FILE: Snow blankets the face of Castle Peak, in California. On Tuesday, a deadly avalanche struck on a north-facing slope near Perry Peak above Frog Lake, and just east of Castle Peak in the Central Sierra Nevada.

FILE: The sun rises on Castle Peak in California.

The skiing that’s accessed from the Frog Lake huts is unforgettable: “There’s tree skiing, there’s glades, there’s couloirs, there’s gnarly cliffs. Anything you want you can get there,” said Kurt Gensheimer, an avid skier and mountain biker from Verdi and the host of the podcast “Mind the Track.” 

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Gensheimer has visited the Frog Lake huts five times, most recently last week. He spent three days at the huts with a group of friends who all live in the Truckee Tahoe area. After a long dry spell in January, they arrived last Friday after a small storm had passed through. Conditions were ideal: fresh snow, clear skies, no wind.

“It was like a perfect three days of skiing, but all the while we knew,” Gensheimer said, referring to the signs of avalanche danger lurking in the snowpack. The incoming storm — the one that blew in earlier this week — would heighten the danger even more.

“There’s 6 to 12 inches of new snow that’s faceting overnight,” Gensheimer said. “Every morning, it’s a new, thicker faceted layer. It’s sitting on top of a firm bed surface. It’s a recipe for a really, really bad snowpack. ... 

“We knew. Like, we were just like, getting the hell out of here, man. It’s going to be slide-mageddon.”

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Gensheimer and his ski partners left the Frog Lake Backcountry Huts on Sunday. They took a different route and never crossed paths with the ill-fated party of skiers and guides who arrived at the huts later that day.

Two days later, at 11:30 a.m. Tuesday, a call went out to 911. Six survivors of an avalanche had called for help, according to Nevada County Sheriff Shannan Moon. 

A semitruck driver clears snow from their windshield during a snowstorm slamming Lake Tahoe in Kings Beach, Calif., on Feb. 17, 2026.

Pine trees are covered in snow during a storm on Tuesday, Feb. 17, 2026, in Truckee Calif.

Avalanches occur in seconds: The snowpack fractures, and a sheet of snow slides down the mountain, hurtling down the path of least resistance. It rips through trees, churning like a frothing river or a giant wave. When avalanche debris settles and stops, the snow quickly solidifies into ice; according to the Utah Avalanche Center, virtually no one can survive if they’re buried in the snow for more than two hours.

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“Someone saw the avalanche and yelled ‘avalanche,’ and it overtook them rather quickly,” Nevada County sheriff Capt. Rusty Greene said at Wednesday’s press conference.

A large rescue effort was dispatched in the middle of the violent storm. While they waited for a rescue, the survivors found several of their companions in the avalanche debris, but it was too late, Moon said at the press conference. Six hours after the survivors called 911, rescuers finally reached the party, helping the survivors get back to safety. All six survivors were rescued off the mountain, including two who were injured. The rest of the skiers remain on the mountain. 

On Wednesday, rescuers worked to recover the bodies of the eight people killed in the avalanche, authorities said. One was the spouse of someone who works for the Tahoe Nordic Search & Rescue organization. A ninth person was still missing but presumed dead. Avalanche hazards and extreme weather conditions have prevented rescuers from returning to the avalanche to recover the bodies. 

In the aftermath, grief, anger and questions surface

Live in a ski town long enough and the sad truth is that you’ll likely encounter an avalanche tragedy. Tahoe itself has seen more than its share of loss: Another horrific avalanche occurred in 1982, when an avalanche at Alpine Meadows killed seven people. Those who were in Tahoe at the time remember it vividly, the storm and the harrowing rescue effort in the days following the avalanche. The Alpine Meadows avalanche was the deadliest in modern California history — until Tuesday. 

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Nevada County Sheriff Shannan Moon updates media on rescue efforts following an avalanche, at a news conference in Nevada City, Calif., on Wednesday, Feb. 18, 2026. 

The sun illuminates the hillside with trees coated with freshly fallen snow above Lake Tahoe in Kings Beach, Calif., on Feb. 20, 2026.

“We’re so upset about this avalanche,” said Steven Siig, a local resident, about Tuesday’s deaths. Siig directed the documentary “Buried” about the 1982 avalanche at Alpine Meadows. 

“One of the things we say to each other — how they were so experienced — [is] there’s this hubris,” Siig said. “It’s that feeling that you know enough that it gives you this fake armor [and] you put yourself in this situation. What the f—k are you guys doing there, man?”

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Blackbird Mountain Guides is a well-known, highly respected company, Siig said. “I can’t believe they lost three soldiers,” he said. 

In the days leading up to the storm, Blackbird Mountain Guides posted an Instagram video discussing the state of the snowpack with its faceting and weak layers. “As we move into a large storm cycle this week, pay close attention to places where faceting has been particularly strong — avalanches could behave abnormally, and the hazard could last longer than normal,” read the caption of the post. 

“My first reaction was I was really frustrated and mad, and then I got sad,” Siig said. “Now all guides are going to be scrutinized even more. We don’t have enough intel to tell us why they were coming out. Maybe someone was sick. Maybe a client had a really important meeting. Maybe they were scared and had to get moving. There is a long list of reasons why they left the way they left.”

For Gensheimer, there was an obvious answer: stay put. “At the end of the day, this was 100% a preventable tragedy,” he said. “This totally could have been avoided. And deep down, it’s just really upsetting that so many families have to be impacted by this when it was such a preventable situation.”

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Gensheimer added: “There was no reason for them to leave [the huts]. None.”

Wondering what happened out there, ruminating on the decisions made and not made, is gut-wrenching. In Truckee and Tahoe, the heavy snow led to canceled school days and kept most people indoors, yet widespread grief was palatable among the backcountry ski community this week. As media outlets from across the nation parachuted into Lake Tahoe to report on the drips of information that slowly surfaced, one local official told me that he had nothing more to add than what’s already been said on social media. A vigil is being planned in Truckee for Sunday.

It’s common practice in avalanche education to analyze case studies and learn from past slides. This tragedy will set a grim precedent: the high death toll, the experience of those involved, the number of factors that don’t seem to add up.

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One can only hope that learning from this avalanche could save lives in the future. But the place for that discussion is not on the internet. It’s pointless and harmful to pick apart what happened on social media. It’s impossible to know what happened, how those decisions were made. Mistakes might seem obvious in hindsight, but the exact truth of what happened Tuesday morning may forever be buried in the snow.

Central Coast editor Andrew Pridgen contributed to this story.

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