Friends search for overdue ‘expert’ skiers and find bodies buried in Oregon avalanche
A couple died after they were buried in an avalanche while “doing what they loved” — skiing Oregon’s backcountry, officials say.
They weren’t any average skiers — in fact, they were “expert skiiers” whose family opened the first ski shop in Bend and “helped shape Central Oregon into the recreational skiing mecca it is today,” the Bend Bulletin reported.
The Deschutes County Search and Rescue Foundation identified the couple as 57-year-old Terance Olaf Skjersaa and 52-year-old Susan Renee Skjersaa in a Feb. 19 post on Facebook.
They were known among their community as Terry and Renee, Central Oregon Daily reported.
When the Skjersaas’ didn’t return on time from a Feb. 17 ski trip in an area known as Happy Valley, their friends and neighbors called 911 and set out on snowmobiles themselves to look for the beloved couple, the Bend Bulletin reported.
Their friends “raced to where a cell phone signal showed Terry’s phone location” and found the Skjersaas buried under an avalanche just before midnight, the outlet reported and Deschutes County Search and Rescue confirmed.
The avalanche likely occurred sometime in the afternoon, “several hours before” their friends found them, the agency said.
It was classified as a D-2 avalanche, which is “dangerous enough” to kill or bury a person “and is often the size of a football field,” KTVZ said on Facebook.
It’s likely the couple “triggered the avalanche themselves” at 6,700 feet on the south facing slope, according to the Central Oregon Avalanche Center’s preliminary report.
“These are expert skiers,” Tim Gibbons told the Bend Bulletin. Gibbons is a friend and a Skjersaa family historian, according to the outlet. “They were highly experienced, they were fit, they were knowledgeable. It’s still a shock.”
In addition to opening the town’s first ski shop, the Skjersaa family also founded the Skyliners ski club, “which hosted competitions that attracted athletes from around the region,” KTVZ reported.
“It’s a tremendous loss to the countless people that were involved with them in their lives,” longtime friend Wade Willers told the Bend Bulletin. “They were the most beautiful humans that I know. It just doesn’t make sense.”
This story was originally published February 20, 2025 at 11:08 AM with the headline "Friends search for overdue ‘expert’ skiers and find bodies buried in Oregon avalanche."
