Tiburon resident among nine killed in avalanche near Lake Tahoe
- Kevin Hessel
- Feb 19
- 6 min read
Updated: Feb 25
Note: Published Feb. 19. Updated Feb. 23. Kate Morse, a 45-year-old Tiburon resident and biotech executive, was among nine people killed Feb. 17 when an avalanche struck a group of backcountry skiers near Castle Peak in Nevada County — the deadliest avalanche ever recorded in California and among the deadliest in U.S. history.
A mother of three, Morse was among eight close friends whose children ski for Sugar Bowl Academy, a competitive ski school near Donner Summit. The group was on a professionally guided Presidents Day weekend trip to remote huts northwest of Truckee, skiing back to the trailhead on the final morning when the slide struck about 11:30 a.m.
The group had decided to cut the trip short and leave early due to worsening conditions, Nevada County Sheriff Shannan Moon said at a Feb. 21 press conference.
All nine bodies were recovered from the mountain by Feb. 21 after weather had delayed the effort for days.
Morse, who grew up in Averill Park, New York, attended Williams College in Massachusetts and earned an MBA from the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College in New Hampshire, where she met her husband, Eric Morse. They married in 2011.
“They bonded over their mutual love of the great outdoors, especially skiing,” friends Christine DeGennaro and Cat Gore wrote on their GoFundMe page for the family. “When they settled in the San Francisco Bay Area, they took frequent trips to Eric’s parents’ home in Serene Lakes, and Sugar Bowl became their home mountain.”
The couple lived in Strawberry before purchasing their Tiburon home in 2015, the same year their first child was born. The two eldest, both daughters, compete for Sugar Bowl Academy.
“Kate was nothing short of an incredible mother and a bright spirit,” DeGennaro and Gore wrote.
The GoFundMe had raised $62,560 as of Feb. 23, while a separate Meal Train had raised $61,146, with a daily meal-support calendar for the family booked through June 29.
Morse spent more than 20 years in the life-sciences industry. She most recently served as vice president of commercial strategy at Septerna, a South San Francisco-based biotechnology company, according to her LinkedIn profile. Before joining Septerna, she held senior roles at Genentech, where she worked in U.S. commercial sales and marketing from 2010 to 2018; Ultragenyx Pharmaceutical; Agios Pharmaceuticals; and Vir Biotechnology, where she rose to vice president of commercial. Earlier in her career, she worked as an associate at McKinsey & Co.
Jeff Finer, CEO and co-founder of Septerna, said in a statement on LinkedIn that Morse “was a devoted wife and mother who proudly brought her children to the office, serving as a truly caring and powerful example to our teams.”
“Kate’s absence has been deeply felt these past few days as we attempt to grapple with the unimaginable reality of losing her,” Finer said. “We will continue to miss her presence, and our hearts will keep Kate’s memory and family close in the time ahead.”
'Devastated beyond words'
Fifteen skiers made the trip: 11 clients, including the group of eight parents, plus four guides from Blackbird Mountain Guides, a Truckee-based touring company. Six survived — four men and two women, ages 30-55, according to the Nevada County Sheriff’s Office. Two survivors were hospitalized with non-life-threatening injuries; one has since been released.
Nine skiers were killed: six clients — all mothers in the friend group — and three guides.
According to a survivor account shared by Moon, a skier spotted the oncoming slide before it hit. Survivors immediately attempted to dig out their companions. Nevada County Undersheriff Sam Brown told CBS News the skiers “went into, I think, frantic mode of trying to find their friends and partners. And they were ultimately able to unbury three individuals who did not survive.”
The six survivors then sheltered under a tarp for hours, using avalanche beacons and an iPhone’s Emergency SOS satellite texting feature to communicate with rescuers. A surviving guide relayed information to the Nevada County Sheriff’s Office for more than four hours, according to Don O’Keefe, chief of law enforcement for the California Office of Emergency Services. Rescue teams reached the group about 5:30 p.m., roughly six hours after the slide, after their snowcat became stuck about 2 miles from the site and crews completed the approach on skis.
The families of the six mothers who died, including Morse, released a joint statement Feb. 19 through spokesperson Jess Weaver of JVP Communications. The statement identified the other five as Danielle Keatley, 44, of Larkspur; Caroline Sekar, 45, of San Francisco; Liz Clabaugh, 52, of Boise, Idaho, who was Sekar’s sister; Carrie Atkin, 46, of Norden; and Kate Vitt, 43, of Greenbrae.
“We are devastated beyond words,” the statement read. “Our focus right now is supporting our children through this incredible tragedy and honoring the lives of these extraordinary women. They were all mothers, wives and friends, all of whom connected through the love of the outdoors. They were passionate, skilled skiers who cherished time together in the mountains.”
The families said the trip had been organized well in advance and that the women were experienced backcountry skiers, trained and equipped with avalanche safety gear. They thanked Nevada County Search and Rescue, Tahoe Nordic Search and Rescue and other responding agencies.
“We are heartbroken and are doing our best to care for one another and our families in the way we know these women would have wanted,” the statement read. “We are asking for privacy and space as our families grieve this sudden and profound loss.”
The three guides who died were identified by the Nevada County Sheriff’s Office as Andrew Alissandratos, 34, of Verdi, Nev.; Nicole Choo, 42, of South Lake Tahoe; and Michael Henry, 30, of Tampa, Florida, and Soda Springs.
Hundreds gathered Feb. 22 at a candlelight vigil in downtown Truckee to honor the nine victims. Nine hearts were displayed as Truckee Vice Mayor Courtney Henderson opened the memorial.
“The families carrying those losses bear a weight that is unbearable,” Henderson said. “What we know is that however that grief is held tonight, it will not be held alone.”
Conditions and rescue
The Sierra Avalanche Center had issued an avalanche watch Feb. 15, the morning the trip began, as a major storm moved into the Sierra Nevada. The center upgraded the watch to an avalanche warning at 5 a.m. Feb. 17, hours before the slide. By the time of the avalanche, the danger rating at Castle Peak had reached 4 on a 5-point scale. The avalanche was classified as a 2.5 on a separate scale measuring the destructive potential of moving debris — between a level that buries a person and one that buries a house, according to the Nevada County Sheriff’s Office.
The rescue operation required extraordinary precautions.
“We sent two teams in from two directions,” Brown told CBS News. “We needed a rescue team for those teams, in the event that an avalanche was triggered.”
One of the victims was married to a member of one of the rescue teams dispatched to the area, Placer County Sheriff Wayne Woo said, making the search and recovery effort particularly difficult for responders.
Blizzard conditions prevented recovery efforts through Feb. 19. Five bodies were recovered Feb. 20 after PG&E executed an avalanche mitigation plan to stabilize the snowpack. California Highway Patrol and California National Guard helicopters transported the remains. The four remaining bodies, including that of a victim whose nearby location had been obscured for days by whiteout conditions, were recovered Feb. 21.
The Tahoe National Forest closed all lands and trails in the Castle Peak area to the public through March 15, citing snowpack instability and the need to preserve first-responder access.
Guides and investigation
Blackbird Mountain Guides founder Zeb Blais said in a statement that all four guides were certified avalanche safety instructors and members of the American Institute for Avalanche Research and Education. The company launched an internal investigation.
“We don’t have all the answers yet, and it may be some time before we do,” Blais said. “This was an enormous tragedy, and the saddest event our team has ever experienced. In addition to mourning the loss of six clients, we also mourn the loss of three highly experienced members of our guide team.”
The Nevada County Sheriff’s Office said Feb. 21 it has opened an investigation into potential criminal negligence in connection with the avalanche. California’s Division of Occupational Safety and Health has launched a separate investigation into the company to determine whether state workplace safety laws were violated; that investigation has six months to complete. Moon said authorities will investigate why guides proceeded with the trip despite the avalanche forecast.
Gov. Gavin Newsom, who lives in Marin, said at a press conference that some of his “wife’s old family friends” were among those on the trip.
“These were some experienced guides that were out there, and that’s what’s even more concerning and disturbing,” he said. His office declined to elaborate, according to the Associated Press.
Reach Executive Editor Kevin Hessel at 415-435-2652.