Several victims of the Sierra Nevada avalanche that struck a group of backcountry skiers this week were from Marin County, Calif., among them a group of female friends who left behind children and spouses.
A group of 15 skiers, which included four guides from Blackbird Mountain Guides, embarked on the backcountry expedition on Sunday and stayed two nights in huts near Castle Peak near Lake Tahoe. Only six of the skiers are known to have survived.
The group had been staying in cabins known as the Frog Lake huts, which are owned by the Truckee Donner Land Trust, a nonprofit land conservancy. The huts are near Donner Summit, just northwest of Truckee, at an elevation of about 7,600 feet above sea level.
They were on the final day of their Presidents’ Day weekend trip and were skiing back to the trailhead from the huts when the avalanche struck, said Shannan Moon, the Nevada County sheriff.
Several victims had ties to the Sugar Bowl Academy, a private, ski-focused school several miles from where at least eight people died, the program said Wednesday night. Officials with the school in Norden, Calif., said they were not releasing the names of or details about the people, but family members and others affiliated with some of the victims confirmed their deaths to The New York Times.
Here is what we know about the victims so far:
Two of the victims were sisters.
Two sisters, Caroline Sekar, 45, and Liz Clabaugh, 52, died in the avalanche, according to their family. Ms. Sekar, who was married and had two children, lived in San Francisco and worked in tech. Ms. Clabaugh lived in Boise, Idaho.
Ms. Sekar’s husband, Kiren Sekar, 46, said in a statement to The New York Times that his wife was “authentic and unabashedly unfiltered.” He said he and his wife had been together for more than 20 years and that she had raised their two children to love hiking, bicycling and skiing.
“Caroline spent her final days doing what she loved best, with the people who loved her most, in her favorite place,” Mr. Sekar wrote. “She was with me, her children and our puppy, and then on one last adventure with her sister and close friends, who she now rests with.”
Several victims were from Marin County, including friends of the sisters.
Ms. Sekar and Ms. Clabaugh were part of a close friend group of moms who loved the outdoors. The other women who died were Carrie Atkin, Danielle Keatley, Kate Morse and Kate Vitt, all from the Bay Area, according to a statement from their families.
“They were all mothers, wives and friends, all of whom connected through the love of the outdoors,” the statement said. “They were passionate, skilled skiers who cherished time together in the mountains.”
The families said the women had planned their ski trip well in advance. They were experienced skiers who were “fully equipped with avalanche safety equipment,” the families said. They said that eight women were on the friends’ ski trip, indicating that two of them survived.
One mother, Ms. Vitt, had two young sons in the Kentfield School District in Marin County. In a letter sent to families on Wednesday, the district said that Ms. Vitt’s children “are safe and are with their father, Geoff, as they navigate this profound loss.”
The letter was provided to The New York Times by Brian Colbert, a member of the Marin County Board of Supervisors, who represents an area that includes the town of Greenbrae, where the Vitt family lives.
Ms. Vitt, 43, graduated from Boston College and worked as a vice president at SiriusXM, according to her LinkedIn profile.
Ms. Morse, 45, lived in Tiburon and worked in biotechnology, according to public records and LinkedIn. Ms. Keatley, 44, lived in Larkspur and worked in the wine business. Ms. Atkin, 46, a leadership coach, had lived in the Bay Area before moving to Norden.
Three of the victims were ski guides, and one was married to a rescuer.
In the group were four professional ski guides from Blackbird Mountain Guides, a company known for high-end adventures and safety courses in mountain recreation. The avalanche killed three of them.
Also among the victims was one who was married to a member of the rescue teams dispatched to search the area after the disaster, officials said. One person remains unaccounted for, but is presumed dead.
The surviving skiers told law enforcement officials that they had been close together when the avalanche hit, Sheriff Moon said, making it unlikely that the missing skier escaped the slide.
“This has not only been challenging for our community — it’s been a challenging rescue, but it’s also been challenging emotionally for our team and our organization,” said Sheriff Wayne Woo of Placer County, which sent 28 people in the rescue mission. “We are committed to being here until the end, and making sure we make all of these recoveries.”
Pooja Salhotra contributed reporting.
Heather Knight is a reporter in San Francisco, leading The Times’s coverage of the Bay Area and Northern California.
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