Mountaineers Capture Spectacular Avalanche in Canada's Rocky Mountains
A small group of mountaineers were visiting the Rocky Mountains in British Columbia, Canada, when they unexpectedly witnessed a large avalanche up close.
Skiier and mountaineer Jurek Ziemkiewicz captured the avalanche on camera. The footage shows the moment the group spot the avalanche approaching from above. They then rush to a safe location, just off its path and right next to a sign saying “Expect the Unexpected.” After a few quiet moments, a torrent of snow and debris appears just a few feet away from the group, barreling down the mountain as they stand and watch in awe.
Credit: Jurek Ziemkiewicz via Storyful
Original video: / 10155131345967604
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“Oh, yeah. Oooh, ahhh, that's how it always starts. Then later there's running and screaming.” ~ Dr. Ian Malcolm Jurassic Park 😂
When witnessing an avalanche, always a good idea to stand on the edge of land right next to hundreds of tons of heavy snow sliding by your feet. If lucky will get to experience both avalanche and landslide right in middle of action.
Indeed! Notice the rather large tree being carried down...
Seriously. You'd think people would realize "solid ground isn't as solid as you think" when millions of tons of otherwise solid-stuff are sliding past like water. standing that close on anything other than bedrock is basically rolling the dice w/ your life.
Yeah...these guys were potential Darwin Award winners.
Bingo, cringing the whole time at them just obliviously laughing with no clue of the danger. Walk right up to the edge of unstable ground.
you did notice how they ran across from the riven that is obviously a regular occurrence, then they came back towards the slide. Only thing better that they could have done was wear a Pink helmet cause that is always the best color to stay safe no matter your experience level!😎🥱
This is amazing! Ie been watching as many avalanche videos as I can. After surviving a small avalanche here jan 1 here in Alaska getting totally buried I realized even the small ones are very powerful. Im glad my friends got me out in time.
Wow. Glad you're alive to tell the tale, bro. Scary as FUCK.
Glad you are alive! Now you have to get even and sometime somewhere you have to keep someone else alive and then you are even! God loves you, buddy!
Welcome back!🤗😇
Glad you’re still with us!
Oh, scary. I’m glad you’re out safe, too. Just a few weeks ago, my cousins were the ones to find and extract a guy, and my uncle (a doctor) was the one to pronounce him dead. They were serendipitously up there for avalanche training and had all the gear on them already. Even though the guy’s group saw him get caught by the avalanche (& got it on video), it took many hours to find him, and it was a miracle my cousin’s pole contacted his snowmobile, since it was pointed at the ground, only had a 2-inch wide bumper to hit, and was feet below the surface. They removed a truck worth of snow to get to him. His neck had been broken on impact.
A river of snow doesn’t sound very threatening...until you see it rip a tree out of the ground without even trying 😬
Here in Canada, even our avalanches are polite😉🇨🇦
Sorry?
i'd say more gay than polite..........
luuke luketer takes one to know one
Just avoid the large cities.
Polite just down the mountain , if they where up they would be fucked
Can we just take a moment to appreciate he didn't film this in vertical 😄
Appreciate the fact that you have a good footage of a close avalanche dont be pathetic teenager living in snapchat tik tok mode
Quick tech question. How do I get the film into my smartphone? And where do I get it developed?
So true
What's in your ass? Lol
Human nature is like this. Walk very slowly away from danger, only to go back and be much closer than before and have a cool video.
Absolutely amazing footage! It's strange how you feel safe late in the Spring when there are just a few patches of snow left from Winter. It's so easy to forget how much snow still remains several thousand feet above you and how quickly it can come down that mountain. It's never a bad idea to look UP occasionally when hiking under snow covered mountains. You never know when you could become a victim.
Imagine how many years the snow has flowed down that path.
Ages, and flash floods and rock slides, and before all that I wouldn’t doubt a glacier was stuck in there
A lot of that erosion looks pretty recent
Looks like an avalanche happened earlier that year, and from the looks of it, it was the first time it had ever happened. If it happened all the time, it wouldn't look all scoured.
@delano62: Some times Mother Nature decides the snow must flow.
The volume and speed of that flow is amazing.
You should meet my wife
Nasty
Greetings, fellow people who are in the avalance algorithm. I rate this an 8/10.
1:51 that embankment can go at anytime.
Their timing is amazing. To not be in another spot where there are falling rocks is amazing. To capture this spot in particular is amazing. To not be skiing on it when the avalanche occured is amazing.
Truly amazing odds, given the chance of them being on the snow when the avalanche starts is relatively low, even though it looks like melting season.
That is an incredible avalanche. Must have taken all the snow off the mountain. Those guys are lucky they were in a safe zone when it happened. They could have been hiking up that cut or skiing in that snow.
Amazing footage. Handsome men!
mother nature is mysterious and amazing & always in control
Filming is more important than personal safety
So incredibly dumb. That bank could have easily given out at anytime. Morons.
Natural selection
@@hiramlohr3125 Although snow is not as erosive as water, it did still pose a danger and I definitely noticed that was quite dumb of them. If the bank had given way, they would’ve been swept away, buried, and suffocating. Not a risk I would’ve personally been willing to take.
But, you know, KZhead!
Yea yea, just stay in the basement of your house because going outside your house is dangerous itself
Watch a huge wet slab avalanche completely fill its run out, then proceed to walk under another large slide path moments later. I'd say it was time to get out of there a while ago.
Perfect example of why people shouldn't have phones with cameras. It wipes out the survival instinct
Sign behind them says 'I expect the unexpected'. How profound!
I was waiting for one of you to jump on it and write it down LOL that would’ve been awesome!
Canadian cottage cheese factory explodes, uphill from hikers.
A million tons of feta cheese
Uuuugggghhhh, that would smell RANCID
Ugh hungry :(
Lmao
3 dead, reducing the population of canada to a low 142 people
*Canadian subtitles:* _"Yes, uh, thank you. You're welcome, thank you, no really you first, thank you, have a nice day."_
I'm speechless, it's looks so innocent yet so deadly in the same breath.... Thank you for sharing your amazing experiences and video with me,, I appreciate it sir.
I wonder if they ever realized how truly fortunate they were? Just amazing footage thank you.
Hey, Robin. Funny running into you over here on this channel! 😀👣
Possibly the most amazing video on KZhead! Most people don't understand how powerful these things really are....
That is simply AMAZING, thank you so much for sharing!
Love the English expect the unexpected quote from the sign posted up as a precursor warning to all who goes tracking in the area, I seen many signs like this from other through the desert from ppl who never made it. An Erie reminder life is short and mother nature rules
I don’t think you’re close enough. Get closer!!!
🤣
They are basques! They can scare the avalanch off
Maybe they can also ride the avalanche down the mountain on their skis 😄
:-)
@@korth26 I was trying to understand why I could only understand when they cuss
Mother Nature just passing by to remind some of us how small we really are.
They are Young, Brave and Strong!!!! They deserve to see this, Very cool it has been shared for anyone to see!!!
one single ! is enough you dumpfuck^^
@@IIISentorIII kiss off asshatt
Glad to see them run - well firstly *run* (been watching people just STAND and film) - and run away to the *side* (not going to outrun that going _downhill_
Multiply that by 1000s of years, the unstoppable force of nature , gouging away moutains
slightly longer than that.
Expect the unexpected! Hah! That's the forest service road out to Cerberus Falls... north of Golden, BC. No wonder they put that sign there.
I was thinking I’ve been here is this the road that used to connect across iob to Thompson? Got washed out few years back
@@danielmango5394 this is the Valenciennes River road. It was drivable last summer, but the last half is cut off by a washout.
hahaha seriously!
I instantly recognized it as being Golden area.
It followed a well beaten path.
Geez that was impressive on video I can only imagine what it would be like to witness it in real life. Thanks for sharing.
Most unique avalanche video I've seen, well done...happy climbing!
I'd be afraid that it would start eating away the earth from that part that they're standing on!
They are skiers. They have no common sense.
@@MikeJones-rk1un And they stand watching that with all that load in their backs, and I was thinking, why don´t they leave the load somewhere and rest the poor backs? it hurt me to see it.
@@LauRa-re9un You leave your packs and get hit by an avalanche you lose your beacon and all your rescue tools
This is amazing. It's almost mesmerizing to watch.
Almost ???
Nature is just SOOOO COOL!
Yeah. Its is pretty cold.
Wow, a sight of a lifetime. Beautiful
Poor guys.... they're going to get to the top and there's not going to be a lick of snow left to ski on
SpellofFate better then getting engulfed by an avalanche
😂😂😂
They also could've been hiking up that draw had nowhere to go when the avalanche started. But, yes, skiing would probably be totally done for the season after that.
Lol
Lmao
Euskaldunak diraaa!!! GORA EUSKADI
Pretty incredible- so fluid and powerful.
... Nature is Awesome . I watched this with the closed captions on , really kinda funny to read while watching ...
"Blue metallic unloving citizen yeah I didn't go in the toilet hey get hola." Nice captions.
Yeah, when it disappears in the trees, walk back to the avalanche scar.
So lucky to be alive and witness this first hand and so close and be so fortunate not have died.
1:28 "Expect the Unexpected sign" Perfect Timing!!!!!!!!!! 🏴☠️
Looks like nature has been carving that path with a river of snow for many years.
Let's see how close we can stand so we get great footage on our cellphones!
That is the coolest thing I've ever seen. It looks like water flowing. And when it took that tree, holy cow. I know they are extremely dangerous , but dang I wish I could have see it in person. That one girl made me mad tho. Totally risking her life to get a photo. Even her friends told her to move back.
That is so amazing, how lucky you were to be there to capture it!!!
That was an amazing video. Talk about being in the right place at the right time.
Very cool that you were able to get this video. Thank you for posting this.
"We're Spanish, avalanche can't hurt us!" I think I would run away as fast as possible.
Did they say that? I always watch these kind of things without sound because the people´s exclamations and comments in the videos bore me. And why would they say that? LOL
That is so Kool.... I know this was amazingly beautiful
Amazing. Their timing was world-class lucky!
Imagine trying to run from an avalanche in ski boots
Aupa esos vascos!!! De eso no hay en el Amboto, jaja. Vaya espectáculo!! Seguro que alguien se quedó con las ganas de surfear. Greetings from RIOJA.
Mother nature carving out the landscape. Great video. 👌👏😎
Crazy to imagine this slide is probably just normal Avy activity. By looking at the landscape this Chute has definitely had some Monster Slides. Still cool to see and glad no one got buried. Thanks for sharing!
There's a legend the avalanche is still going today. 😂
Even avalanches are polite in Canada. Avalanche: “Psst... I hope I won’t disturb anyone!”
Jesus, the guys still lived. Thanks God
That's amazing. Way cooler in slow motion.. thank you for sharing.. awesomeness.
That was normal speed.
No kidding.. lol
I guess they don't realize that the embankment they're standing near the edge of could easily collapse.
I mountain a bit and I would definitely be thinking that more *could* give away, or the flow from above could greatly increase at any moment, taking out more of those trees. However, I would also be thinking that it would be shame to miss out on stacking this footy.
@@meg6205 I "mountain" a fair bit and in this area (live in the Canadian Rockies for 12 years) that slope is not as stable as you think.
@@meg6205 thats not a class 5 son.
@@meg6205 Oh I didn't know I needed to supply my resume. Grew up in Revelstoke BC started in the BC at 16, moved to Canmore/Banff at 30 for 12 years where I skinned and climbed, hiked and packed a lot especially while I worked for the ACC and now back in Revelstoke at 44. So YA! I grew in in the mountains too and am very familiar with this terrain and have been involved in avi situations. And of course you know but Waddington and Coastal ranges are very different than the choosy soil and rock in the Rockies. I guess you know there are never exceptional events right?? like the 100 year flood in Canmore in 2013. I shouldn't question you though you were on a backpacking trip for a couple days, WOW.
@@meg6205 that wasn't 5000m, there aren't even any 16500ft peaks in that area never mind prominence. Oh ya 'wet loose' like your mom?
The guy in the red shirt had the right idea, RUN!
WOW!!! AMAZING VIDEO!!! One of the best avalanche caught on tape!! And you’re standing 2 feet away!!! Go figure 😃😃😃👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼⛷🏔⛷🏔
I went on and on and on. That was incredible. Wish I had been there to see it in person.
Welp. The auto-generated subtitles are... Well, they're inaccurate, shall we say.
Almost everything they are saying is in Basque, Europes estrangest language.
create Colin Smith are we?
Hablan una mezcla de vascuence y blasfemias en español. Resulta lamentable.
If you get caught in this, you have no chance. These guys seem to not quite understand the danger.
Totally, when all trees are falling down, its too late and you die badly. Dont think it never happen, same with flood.
WOW! So that's what an avalanche looks like when it's running out of steam? Cool!
That is amazing. A snow river. Great video
Man they sure don't seem like they are as awed and humbled by this as they very much should be. Seeing this kind of power first hand deserves a bit more respect I think, maybe it's just me tho?
they reacted like idiots.
@@667DOOM hear hear good sir or madam 👌
Kaixo Patxi! I can't understand a word but I suppose it's basque!
Ilkka Harmanen Yeeep it's basque :)
1:27-1:29 too????
That scour mark is amazing!
Wow that was incredible!
"Be like water, my friend! Water can flow, or can crash" - Bruce Lee
When you ask for no lumps in your mashed potatoes and you get this.
Avalanche surfing, next extreme sport ‼
Mother Nature just doing her thing.
*AXUITELNO!*
"Expect the unexpected" *walks toward avalanche*
It was a good thing they ran uphill when they did, even though it was so far away at the time when first seen. Wow!
Nature in all of her perfect beauty!!!
🙌🏻Increíble es la mezcla de idiomas en la que habláis 😏 buen rollo eeeh✌️
No hay mucha mezcla. Salvo la lectura del contenido del cartel en inglés ("Expect the unexpected"), la comunicación es en euskara, con su dosis (lógica y habitual) de palabrotas en castellano (el euskara no es una buena lengua para los "juramentos", son muy flojos) y alguna expresión como "a cámara lenta", "al loro", "brutal"... que la mayor parte de euskaldunes es incapaz de decir en euskara (pasa con muchas palabras comunes también como "riñonera", "linterna frontal", "parabrisas"... que, a falta de unas buenas raíces hundidas en la lengua propia, se usan en castellano).
; )
Jejejeje el "mecagüen dios" si que es universal
Franz I wonder why there are no trees growing here and what knocked all those other ones over, Must have been a strong wind or something.
Now that was fun to watch.
Wow, that was amazing!
Jesus. That's terrifying.
It is? I must've missed that part.
Where in the Canadian Rockies was this recorded?
It is an enormous volume of snow and ice. It flows like water and looks like foam!
That is a cut channel. It is deliberately put there to capture avalanches and direct them to a safe place where the snow can accumulate. Obviously, by looking at the sides you can see it gets a lot of use! I do wish you could follow it down the mountain though. Every time they would pan down I was hoping you could see further... I would love to see it coursing through that channel and making a bit snow plume as it piles up at the bottom.
"Exspecttt the unexpected" 😂
You're really lucky the slope did not achieve liquefaction.. entire seemingly stable ground can disappear fast next to all that churning ice and snow
Tree @ 2:15 is like, "I REGRET NOTHiiiiiinnnnnnngggg!" 🤘😫🤘
That's one really polite avalanche
When you're ready to get to the top of the mountain, but the top comes down for you.
Like a river never seen snow like that . .
Truly spectacular!
It's a fantastic capture. Bravo