A Northstar California ski instructor had a freak accident Sunday afternoon at the Lake Tahoe ski resort that resulted in his death.
Dennis Baltimore, 35, was skiing down Village Run around noon when a snowboarder in front of him encountered a patch of ice and subsequently lost control.
To avoid crashing with the snowboarder, Baltimore reportedly veered to the left, went off the trail, and died after he hit rocks and crashed into a creek near the Village Run slope at Northstar California.
It was the second death in two days at a Lake Tahoe area ski resort. On Saturday, a skier got swept under an avalanche in a closed section of the Mt. Rose Ski Tahoe resort. His dead body was found early Sunday afternoon by rescuers. The name of the 64-year-old skier had not been released as of Monday afternoon.
The Placer County Sheriff’s Office was waiting an autopsy result Monday to determine the cause of death. Baltimore’s girlfriend, Jillian Torrez, said he died of spinal and head injuries. Baltimore and several instructors were participating in a certification training class that day.
“Northstar California Resort, Northstar Ski Patrol and the entire Vail Resorts family extend our deepest sympathy and support to our employee’s family and friends. We are all devastated by the loss of this member of our team,” Nadia Guerriero, Northstar California Resort’s vice president and general manager, said in a statement.
Baltimore is from Hermosa Beach in Southern California and moved to the Kings Beach area five years ago. Almost immediately he began working as a ski instructor at Northstar. He also worked at Willard’s Sport Shop in Tahoe City, according to Torrez.
Mt. Rose skier: The skier likely triggered an avalanche when he headed down the Jackpot Chute after hiking up the mountain with a fellow skier.
The incident took place Saturday morning and one of the skiers witnessed the other one getting caught in an avalanche and reported it at 10:18 a.m. According to Mt. Rose spokesperson Mike Pierce, the missing skier didn’t have any safety gear, including a shovel, beacon or probe. Pierce said there was about 16 inches of snow accumulation Saturday at the resort of Mt. Rose Highway near North Lake Tahoe.
Washoe County Sheriff’s spokesman Bob Harmon said two men reportedly crossed into the Jackpot run in an area of steep terrain known as the Chutes, which were closed for the day due to avalanche danger.
The avalanche was reportedly 350-feet wide and moved 1,000 feet down the slope, and was as deep as 10 feet in some spots, according to a report from the Sierra Avalanche Center.
Search dogs along with crews from the Washoe County Sheriff’s Office, Truckee Meadows Fire Protection District, North Lake Tahoe Fire Department and Mt. Rose Ski Patrol began looking Saturday for the missing skier.
However, the searchers were called back as a safety precaution around 2 p.m. so Mt. Rose personnel could perform some additional avalanche mitigation. The search resumed Sunday morning.
“They definitely had to hike up the traverse to get to this closed area,” Pierce told the Reno Gazette newspaper. “So yeah, it’s one of those things where in general there’s a reason those areas are closed.”
