Cairngorms avalanche victims had little chance of survival
Three people who died after an avalanche in the Cairngorms yesterday would have had almost no chance of survival, it has emerged.
Two men and a woman who were buried under several tonnes of snow shortly after mid-day were dug out and flown to Aberdeen Royal Infirmary. However, they could not be revived.
The victims were among two groups of six people practising winter skills in the Chalamain Gap - a deep, rocky cleft in the Cairngorms, on the route from the Cairngorm ski road to the Lairig Ghru.
Fifty-one people including police, Cairngorm Mountain Rescue Team (CMRT), a team from Glenmore Lodge, the CairnGorm Mountain ski patrol, search and rescue dogs and two RAF Lossiemouth helicopters were involved in the rescue operation.
The rescue teams used probes to find the victims but they had been under the snow for too long.
CMRT Leader Willie Anderson said: “One of the avalanche victims had been on the safer side of the Gap where there was very little chance of an avalanche.
"Unfortunately he was on the lower part of the slope and was enveloped by an avalanche triggered from the other side of the Gap.
“They were buried under three to four metres of snow. Ideally your friends need to dig you out from an avalanche as soon as possible but the victims were buried under four metres of snow and you need shovels to dig rather than the ice axes their friends had.”
He said that statistically anyone buried under two metres of snow has virtually no chance of survival.
More on this story as we get it . . .
