A backcountry skier missing since Sunday has still not been located. Extreme avalanche danger in Palmer’s Hatcher Pass area, where Liam Walsh was thought to have gone skiing, has blocked search efforts.
Allie Barker is a weather forecaster with the Hatcher Pass Avalanche Warning Center. She accompanied an Alaska State Troopers and Alaska Mountain Rescue team on a search attempt Wednesday
“We flew up to assess the terrain to see if it would be safe to bring up a rescue team and were turned around by weather.”
The helicopter crew made the attempt around 1 p.m. Wednesday. Barker says weather conditions are deteriorating rapidly. The National Weather Service has forecast heavy rains for Southcentral tonight.
Barker says Tuesday’s avalanche, which blocked Hatcher Pass Road, has not been cleared, and it is expected the road will remain closed for days.
APTI Reporter-Producer Ellen Lockyer started her radio career in the late 1980s, after a stint at bush Alaska weekly newspapers, the Copper Valley Views and the Cordova Times. When the Exxon Valdez ran aground in Prince William Sound, Valdez Public Radio station KCHU needed a reporter, and Ellen picked up the microphone.
Since then, she has literally traveled the length of the state, from Attu to Eagle and from Barrow to Juneau, covering Alaska stories on the ground for the AK show, Alaska News Nightly, the Alaska Morning News and for Anchorage public radio station, KSKA
elockyer (at) alaskapublic (dot) org | 907.550.8446 | About Ellen
