SNOW

Buried Alive
By JOAN NAPOLITANO as told to ERIK LUNDEGAARD [NY Times]

Last March, four friends and I decided to go snowshoeing one Sunday because it was supposed to be a bright sunny day. We drove to Barlow Pass in the Cascade Mountains in Washington State. Once we got on the trail, we didn't see any tracks. Nobody had been there since the last snowfall. The trail winds for about three miles through the woods with a 2,500-foot elevation. A pretty steady climb.

I don't see myself as a risk-taker, though I like to do things outdoors that people might think are risky -- like scaling rocks or climbing Mount Rainier. But when you're rock climbing, you're protected by ropes and gear. I like saying I've done dangerous things. But to me snowshoeing is just hiking in winter.

We were heading to Gothic Basin, but after three hours we reached a point where we had to cross an open slope. I don't know a lot about avalanches. I took only one class. It takes years to really know how to read the terrain, but there are certain basics. A dense bunch of trees can hold the snow in place -- not that they helped us that day. The three guys had already crossed the open slope by the time we got there, but Caroline and I decided not to risk it. We retraced our steps and sat down with some trees behind us and ate lunch. Caroline had Kyle's lunch, so we radioed him, and he walked back and joined us.

We were looking across the whole valley. A beautiful panorama. Caroline and I had our backs up-slope, and Kyle was standing taking pictures. He looked up the mountain and said, ''Here comes some small stuff behind you.'' I jumped up and saw these little snowballs coming down. For about a second. Then the whole slope gave way, and I knew we were doomed. I thought, Maybe I can grab this tree, and then I was slammed and found myself going headfirst down the mountain screaming in my head, ''I don't want to die.'' I could see my hands and my sunglasses, bouncing in front of me, but that was it. The snow above me was light blue -- I wasn't buried that deep -- and then my leg slammed into a tree or a rock and I was spun like a rag doll. The rumbling was so loud.

The snow grew heavier and started to encase me. I remembered that in an avalanche you're supposed to swim like you're in the ocean. So I pushed my body up and shot out of the snow. And the sky was so blue, the sun was right there, and I could feel the avalanche slowing down. So I thought: I'm out, I'm safe.

But it picked up speed again. I could feel myself being shifted, and there was nothing I could do. Finally I managed to grab a tree and stop myself. The avalanche flowed around me for about five more seconds before stopping completely. I was facing up-slope. There were ski poles sticking out of the snow at weird angles, and I could see Caroline and Kyle. She was screaming, and he was moaning. Then he passed out. She ran to him on snowshoes. All of our snowshoes stayed on. Despite the fact that mine came off on the trail, they stayed on during the avalanche.

My leg wasn't bloody, but when I tried standing, it gave way. If I moved slowly with no twisting, I could walk. I managed to reach Kyle and Caroline. He was coming around, holding his ribs, and he said, ''Your face is scratched.'' I took a clump of snow and put it against my face, and it came away bloody. When I saw it later, it looked as if I'd been clawed at by some animal.

I was cursing and giving orders. I didn't feel as if I was in shock. I was probably just talking to keep shock away and stay focused on the present. Our backpacks and radios were buried, but Caroline wrote ''ALIVE'' in the snow for the others, and we hurried down. Half an hour later, they caught up to us. They made a splint for my knee by taking apart a hiking pole and helped carry me out. Besides tearing a ligament in my knee, I had also cracked a bone.

When people found out about the accident, the first thing they would ask was ''Was it a big avalanche?'' That just shocked me, because it implied they had no idea of what we had been through. So I'd tell them, ''When you're in an avalanche, they're all big.'' But I guess it wasn't that big, because it didn't kill me. There wasn't enough snow, so it petered out in the end.

For a couple of months, every time I'd think about the avalanche, I'd start crying. That's the way my body coped. The tears were always just below the surface. It was partly the trauma and partly how it left me. Injured. The wilderness has always been my safe place -- the place I'd go to step out of society and process things -- but now the wilderness did this to me.

Sometimes there's a part of me that says: ''Wow, you're pretty tough. You survived an avalanche.'' Then immediately another part of me says, ''Don't you ever brag about this.'' Bragging implies that you actually did something; you set a goal and accomplished it. But surviving had nothing to do with me. It's not as if I could say: ''Watch me. I'll do it again.''