Remembering the Historic Valentine Avalanche that Created a 30-Foot Wall of Snow on Mt. Shasta

On February 13, 2019, a giant avalanche slammed Mount Shasta, which has come to be known as the Valentine Avalanche. Although it wasn’t seen or heard, a 30-foot wall of debris sitting around 7,200 feet on the mountain told a story of a historic avalanche.

It was in the middle of what has become known as #FebruBURIED in 2019, where a historic amount of snow fell all over Northern California, breaking numerous snowfall records at ski resorts in the Sierra Nevada. The snowfall was so heavy during this time that, luckily, no one was on Mt. Shasta when the massive avalanche was triggered.

The event was only discovered after the guys at Shasta Mountain Guides hiked up to Avalanche Gulch in the days following Valentine’s Day to find an interesting scene. A 30-foot wall of snow that ran several miles down the mountain was incredible evidence of a D4 event, just one notch away from the largest possible avalanche.

In the days following the event, photos of the avalanche’s aftermath began to surface online, and it showed the 30-foot wall of snow going all the way down the mountain:

There were also some great photos taken by Dawn Patrol Images:

The historic event shows the power of nature and the danger posed to any outdoor adventure on the mountain.