Snowmobiler Boe Balis, 28, of Bellevue, died in an avalanche Friday, April 1, about 20 miles northwest of Ketchum.
Balis graduated from Wood River High School in 1994 and was the proprietor of Paradise Paint in Bellevue. Balis left behind his wife of seven years, Toni Marie, and his daughter, Sarah.
Balis was riding with a partner, Gino Maccarillo, also of Bellevue, in Brodie Gulch, located about nine miles out the Baker Creek drainage in the Smoky Mountains, a popular area for advanced snowmobile riders. The accident occurred just over a year after an avalanche claimed Kimberly resident Justin Dee Frederickson, also a snowmobiler, at the head of the neighboring Apollo Creek drainage on a similar, east-northeast slope aspect.
The Avalanche Center has been reporting deep instability in the late winter snowpack since the end of March, particularly on shadowy slopes, said Sawtooth National Forest Avalanche Center forecaster Chris Lundy. Lundy stumbled upon Maccarillo searching for Balis while out gathering information for his avalanche advisories. Immediately calling the emergency in to the Avalanche Center on his satellite phone after finding that the slide debris from the avalanche was a recent event, Lundy kicked the search and rescue wheels in motion shortly after 2 p.m. Friday. The avalanche was estimated to have occurred between 1:30 and 2 p.m. on an east-facing slope extending 1,000 feet northeast across the basin.
Last week, Wednesday, March 27, before the slide that killed Balis, another snowmobile triggered an avalanche that slid 400 vertical feet on a north-northeast facing slope, but the crown of the fracture was a quarter of a mile wide. That slide along with another Smoky Mountain avalanche on Titus Ridge the previous Friday, March 25, which severely injured a backcountry skier, offered substantial clues to the current avalanche danger. Details of the events have been consistently uploaded to the Avalanche Center Web site, www.avalanche.org/~svavctr/index.html.
Photographs of recent slide activity and daily advisories are posted on site daily through the winter. They will be updated periodically through April 15. The backcountry skier, Steve Waltcher, injured in the Titus slide was rescued by his ski companions and flown by Sun Valley Heli-Ski to St. Luke's Wood River Medical Center. There he was transferred to a Lifeflight helicopter and flown to St. Alphonsus Regional Medical Center in Boise.
Balis body was also recovered by helicopter Friday from the remote mountain terrain about 10 miles west of Highway 75. Lundy met Maccarillo in Brodie Gulch after investigating a huge avalanche on Baker Peak that showed a number of snowmobile tracks entering the slide path.
"I shut my engine off and heard (Maccarillo) calling for help," Lundy said. He discovered that the snowmobilers did not have avalanche beacons, shovels or probes. Maccarillo and Lundy relied on multiple tracks leading into the Brodie Gulch slide path to estimate where Balis was buried.
Some 50 professional first responders and search and rescue volunteers from the Blaine County Sheriff's office, Blaine County Search and Rescue, the Galena Nordic Ski Patrol, the Ketchum Fire Department, Wood River Fire and Rescue and Sun Valley Heli-Ski descended on Baker Creek to help recover Balis' body.
"It's not to beat up on anybody ... If there was any way to make a statement, the deal is a week ago up in McCall a snowmobiler was buried 10 feet deep and survived. His friends with the McCall Volunteer Fire Department had him out in 15 minutes. They must have known what they were doing," said Sun Valley Police Chief Cam Daggett, who set out Friday with his search and rescue dog, Chaly, to join the ground search for Balis. His body was found at about 5 p.m. "By the time we all came rushing in it had been hours. That's just way too long. Snowmobilers need to be like backcountry skiers. You have to train with (avalanche beacons) under stressful conditions. You've got to do (a search) within 15 minutes or it's over."
While Daggett and other rescuers were en route on snowmobiles to Brodie Gulch, a Life Flight helicopter was able to get to the scene with Sun Valley Heli-Ski owner and search and rescue dog trainer Mark Baumgartner. His dog Otto locked on to Balis' scent quickly, uncovering one of Balis' boots within three minutes, Baumgartner said.
Maccarillo, Lundy and another avalanche forecaster, Jeff Halligan finished extricating Balis' body. He was buried headfirst under about two feet of compacted snow some eight feet from the toe of the debris field. Coroner Russ Mikel said that Balis did not suffer any broken bones or internal injuries, but that he died from suffocation.
Despite the tragedy of the event, Baumgartner rewarded his dog for a job well done.
"It was such a sad thing, but it was gratifying that the dog did such a good job," Baumgartner said, explaining that it was Otto's first real find in seven years of training. "The problem we have right now is the connectedness of this slab. We knew we were going to be up against it. It has borne itself out statewide."
Daggett pointed out that such events, including human triggered avalanches, often come in cycles. Lundy said that locations of instability will likely remain a considerable risk factor for the rest of the year, something he and other forecasters have been repeating for nearly two weeks.
Sun Valley Heli-Ski spokesman Sigi Vogel said increasing recreational activity in the backcountry has sparked discussions about funding a full-time winter helicopter rescue program.
The Sun Valley Heli-Ski tanker truck was on hand during the recovery of Balis' body and helped Life Flight refuel.
"The Lifeflight crew was very professional. I was impressed," Baumgartner said. "Things have gone pretty smoothly with everyone on search and rescue. There is a necessity to continue working on that. Hopefully this has been a wake-up call."
Blaine County Sheriff Walt Femling and Search and Rescue Commander Lt. Greg Sage agreed with the sentiment and the evident spirit of cooperation.
"In my critique all the agencies worked well together," Sage said, recalling that during the rescue effort when everyone realized they were only going to recover Balis' body, Ketchum Fire Chief Greg Schwab said, "The only way we can fail now is if we get somebody hurt."
Sage said it was a 50-50 chance of getting Lifeflight to the scene of the avalanche and that Lundy had established a safe route in for ground crews.
"Chris had established a safe route in. That was most critical to us," Sage said.
He also said a contingency plan was to abandon the search until the next day if it got too late, but Otto and the helicopter made all the difference.
Memorial services for Balis will be held 1 p.m. Friday, April 8, at the Community Campus Auditorium in Hailey. A memorial fund for Sarah Balis has been established at First Bank of Idaho, PO Box 9000, Ketchum, ID 83340.
Sun Valley Police Chief Cam Daggett and his dog Chaly make their way Friday afternoon to join a ground party headed to search for the body of snowmobile avalanche victim Boe Balis, of Bellevue. Photo by David N. Seelig
