DENVER -- The kind of avalanche that killed five people in Colorado over the weekend is among the most difficult to predict and trigger, and it's dangerous because of the amount of snow normally involved.
Saturday's slide in near Loveland Pass is called a deep persistent slab avalanche, and it was the kind of avalanche that backcountry snowboarders and skiers were warned of in the area that day. It's also the same type of avalanche that killed a snowboarder Thursday near Vail Pass.
"Unfortunately, we were warning about the exact problem that these fellows became entangled with," Ethan Greene, director the Colorado Avalanche Information Center, said Monday.
Besides the four snowboarders and a skier who died, one other man in the group was buried but survived. Some were on snowboards that can be split in two for climbing up slopes. All had avalanche beacons, used to locate people buried under the snow.
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