Authorities on Saturday recovered the body of a 26-year-old Utah skier who was found buried in snow following an avalanche, police said.
Michael Besendorfer’s body was recovered around 12 p.m. Saturday a day after he died while skiing with a friend in a remote area north of Electric Lake, Emery County Sheriff’s Office said.
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Michael Besendorfer’s body was recovered Saturday a day after he was buried in snow by an avalanche. (Emry County Sheriff's Office)
Besendorfer and a friend went for a ski tour Friday afternoon and were on their second run when the 26-year-old never made it down the slope. His friend walked up and discovered an avalanche had occurred. He called for help after he couldn’t locate or find any signs of Besendorfer in the snow, FOX13 reported.
Rescuers began searching for the skier Friday night, but suspended the search due to dangerous conditions. The search continued the next morning.
"What makes this super heartbreaking is these two men were not prepared for their own self-rescue, that means they didn’t have the appropriate rescue gear," Craig Gordon a forecaster with the Utah Avalanche Center, told FOX13.
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A search dog named Lucy was deployed in the area and helped find Besendorfer.
“Wasatch Back Country Rescuers positively located the body based on Lucy's indication, and recovery efforts began. Emery County Sheriff Greg Funk extends a huge thanks to all agencies involved in this search,” Emery County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement on Facebook.
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Besendorfer’s death is the first avalanche fatality in Utah in nearly three years.
"Right now, any slide that you trigger is going to be deep, it’s going to be dangerous, it’s going to break wide, it’s going to break down to the ground," Gordan said. "These are unmanageable avalanche conditions.”