The mountains where Emily Self went skiing over winter break in Whistler, Canada. Photo courtesy Emily Self.
One day during winter break, when much of the OSU community was relaxing at home, Army ROTC cadet Emily Self was frantically digging people out of the snow after an avalanche overtook her party while skiing in Canada.
“You know when you’re caught in a wave in the ocean, tumbling, and you can’t get out of it? That’s what it felt like, but with more pressure,” Self said, recounting the December 2024 experience.
Self, a second-year biochemistry and molecular biology student and avid skier, went skiing with her older brother, a guide and two strangers in the backcountry near Whistler, British Columbia, shortly before Christmas. It was a perfect blue-sky day with a thick blanket of fresh powder — in fact, it was the best snow she’d ever skied in her life.
The group of five started on their third run of the trip, down an area where another group on the mountain had skied earlier that day. The guide went first to clear a path, followed by the other pair of siblings, then Self, with her brother behind her.
And then the mountain came crashing down.
“I don’t remember hearing the avalanche; I don’t remember hearing anything, just being absolutely face-planted into the snow by the snow behind me,” Self said. “I remember feeling like I got hit by a truck.”
Luckily, she had been skiing to the left when the snow hit and managed to avoid the worst of it. After 20 or 30 seconds of chaos, the avalanche spit her out to the side, facing forward, standing upright and buried to her waist. But she was the only one visible above the snow.
At the start of their day, the skiers had received a 45-minute crash course in avalanche safety from their guide, who also equipped them with radio signal transceivers, probes and shovels that they strapped to their backpacks. Thankfully, Self’s gear was still attached to her pack.
“I kind of freak out and dig myself out, and then I’m like, ‘What do I do now?’” she recalled. “I’m looking around and hoping there’s someone else who can take charge, because I don’t want this responsibility.”
Post-avalanche, the snow field looked like massive chunks of broken concrete, but Self could just make out the outline of their guide’s bright red coat as he struggled to dig himself out further down the slope, so she knew he was alive.
She switched her transceiver to “Search” mode so she could pick up the signals of her companions, and started slogging toward the nearest one.
“I’m panicking, but I’m like, ‘Might as well put the training they gave us to good use, go back to what they told me,’” she said. “Every skill they taught me that day, I used.”
Self got as close to the first signal as she could, then used her probe to poke around in the snow until she hit something. She’d stripped off her gloves while extricating herself, but grabbed her shovel and started digging through the hard-packed snow as fast as she could.
The buried skier was a 16-year-old girl from England, also skiing with her brother that day. She was breathing but panicking, Self said, so she dug until she could relieve some of the pressure on the girl’s chest and help her to calm down.
The other group on the mountain that day had fortunately arrived on the slope by then, and Self saw them stop to dig farther up the hill — presumably for her own brother. The other group’s guide continued down the mountain and called for help freeing another trapped skier, about 30 feet away, who turned out to be the English girl’s brother.
“He wasn’t breathing when we found him, but I accidentally hit him on the head with the shovel, and he started snoring, like you would in low oxygen,” Self said. “He was face-down in the snow. He wakes up, thank goodness, and freaks out, understandably.”
After she and the other guide managed to flip him right-side-up, Self went another 30 or 40 feet downhill to help free her own guide; he’d managed to clear the snow from his face but was still stuck. She dug him out and then climbed back up to the English girl to get her the rest of the way out.
“This whole time, I still don’t know where my brother is, or if he’s OK,” she said. “I finally started walking up the mountain, and he’s walking down. He was buried for like 15 minutes under a few meters of snow; he was definitely in the worst position of everyone.”
Miraculously, no one was injured. All five skiers were transported by helicopter back to town, where Self and her brother got checked by paramedics.
Emily, right, with her brother Brandon before they started skiing that day. Photo courtesy Emily Self.
In the aftermath, instead of getting stuck in all the “what-if” questions that come to mind, Self says she’s thankful she was able to take charge despite her fear.
“I would like to think I’m a very calm person under pressure who is able to focus on the task at hand,” she said. “There were definitely moments I was freaking out, but I still knew what needed to get done, and it wasn’t affecting my ability to get that task done. I was able to figure out what was the highest priority and work that way.”
Though she’s only been in ROTC for a year and a half, she says the program helped her feel confident in taking charge. This was especially true in the moments when the second group of skiers coming down the mountain mistakenly thought there was still a fifth skier missing. Self had to get them to listen when she explained that she was the fifth person and had simply turned her transceiver to “Search” so they weren’t seeing her signal.
“The main thing I took away from this was confidence in myself, and knowing that I can make a correct decision, or that I can make a decision quickly,” she said. “I think that’s going to help me in all aspects of life, and it’s incredibly beneficial in the military.”
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