LITTLE COTTONWOOD CANYON — A car was pushed off the road and partially buried in an avalanche in Little Cottonwood Canyon on Sunday, police said.
Additionally, avalanche operations and cleanup throughout the morning, combined with lines of anxious skiers and snowboarders, led to long traffic delays.
The avalanche hit the road late Sunday morning near the White Pine Lake area, Unified police tweeted. No one in the car was injured.
The Little and Big Cottonwood Canyons saw over two feet of snow by Sunday afternoon. No other incidents occurred as a result of the avalanche, but it left a foot and a half of debris on the road, said Shawn Lambert, Utah Department of Transportation South District engineer.
Those who were above the slide after the avalanche were routed to resorts, while those who were below were sent out of the canyon while crews cleared the debris, Lambert said.
Ron Warden, of Florida, came to Utah to ski. After a 3 1⁄2 hour trip stuck in “horrible” traffic, the avalanche came down right on the heels of Warden and his companion.
“We were just about up to Snowbird, and over to the left side of our eyes, we could see this avalanche just coming down towards the car, and next thing you know, the car’s just covered in snow. Steamed up the windshield right away,” he recalled.
They stopped, jumped out of the car, and saw snow and dust piled up behind them. Someone in the car behind them urged them to keep driving.
The pair was “lucky enough to enjoy another full day of skiing,” he said.
Warden said he learned from the event that “you’ve gotta be prepared at all times. You don’t know what’s going on out there. It’s Mother Nature, she makes her own decisions when she wants to. We thought everything was fine, and within seconds, that all changed. We were very fortunate to get away.”
Avalanche control had been going on earlier Sunday morning with road closures. The avalanche control continued into Sunday afternoon, and Unified officers turned vehicles away at the mouth of the canyon, according to police. The canyon was reopened just before 2 p.m.
Throughout the morning, the canyons saw traffic lined up for miles to get into ski resorts. One family snowboarding at Antczak Park in Cottonwood Heights said they went there to avoid the long traffic queue up the canyons.
The past four days showered between 20 and 50 inches of snow on northern Utah’s mountains, said Craig Gordon, forecaster with the Utah Avalanche Center.
“It is a lot of snow where just a little bit of variation in wind or a couple more inches can quickly escalate the backcountry avalanche hazard,” Gordon said.
During heavy snow storms, he urged people to watch for the latest backcountry avalanche forecast at utahavalanchecenter.org for the area they want to drive in.
As more storms are on the way, Gordon said, the avalanche danger could increase overnight into Monday.
“If we’re seeing or hearing about natural avalanche activities, or course, this is a big red flag” for driving in those areas, according to Gordon.
The avalanche center also tweeted a warning to those in Logan Sunday.
“Very dangerous conditions will become more widespread tonight, with large, fast moving, and long running natural avalanches quite possible” in upper elevation slopes, the center advised.