Everyone is safe - Jackson Headwall Avalanche

Miraculously, no one was hurt in the massive avalanche at Jackson Hole on the Headwall today. The avalanche caused extensive damage to the new lodge at the top of the mountain. The building houses a cafe, ski shop, a high end dinner restaurant and a fancy lunch cafeteria; all of which have been opened for less than 1 year. Everyone on the hill was surprised about the original plan to construct this building in an avalanche zone. Check out the pictures from TetonAT - a local search and rescue member who was called to the scene.

The pictures with the tables and chairs on his site are taken from the 2nd story -- think about how much snow is piled up outside!

Jackson Hole - Headwall Avalanche

It appears that the headwall at Jackson Hole slid shortly before 10am on Monday (12/29/08). I do not think that the Gondi was open and I hope that people were not caught in the slide. You can watch the action live on the Jackson Hole webcam: http://www.jacksonhole.com/webcam/br.jpg

1st Hand Account of the Alta 2 Avalanche at Jackson Hole

I found this comment on my blog today - it was left in response to the post on the avalanche on Alta 2 at Jackson Hole. This was the inbounds slide that occurred before the larger event on a similar aspect in the Paintbrush/Toilet Bowl/Tower 3 area which killed a local skier.

It is interesting to hear the perspective of this skier, especially considering he is an out of state visitor.
______________________________________________________
Hey,
I am the skier you described in the avalanche. I'm 18 and 6' 4" and this was the first avalanche I have ever been in. I got very lucky with my height to avoid getting buried and somehow I got carried in between a set of 4 or 5 trees without hitting any of them.

I have had many people ask me if I had an avalanche beacon with me. Unfortunately my response was "no" because I am from the east coast and have never even thought I would ever witness an avalanche let alone be in one.

Unfortunately someone told me that a skier named Dave was searching for his ski in the deep powder and was killed from suffocation and a broken neck as an avalanche came crashing onto him off of Thunder Lift.

Jackson Hole got too much snow and they couldn't control it, but they wanted to open the mountain for the Christmas crowds. It was a huge mistake and everyone should learn a lesson from this. Any person skiing/riding that day could have been killed like Dave and we should all take this into consideration.

Inbounds Avalanche - Jackson Hole

I witnessed an in-bounds avalanche at Jackson Hole Mountain Resort today while riding the Sublette chair lift. It appeared that a group of 3-4 skiers were in the process of descending Alta 2 one by one and when the final skier was a few turns into the run the snow released. The crown of the avalanche appeared to be 2-3 feet and I would guess that it ran on the November rain crust.

The skier was carried about 100 yards downhill and managed to avoid a number of trees during the slide. It appeared that he came to a rest buried up to his waist, but mostly on top of the pile.

The lesson learned from this slide is that Alta 2 was well skied prior to the avalanche. I would guess that about 20 people skied the chute prior to the skier who set off the slide. For people who are unfamiliar with Jackson Hole Mountain Resort, Alta 3 is a steep and narrow North facing chute towards the top of the mountain.

About 45 minutes after the avalanche on Alta 2 all lifts were shut down and rumors of additional avalanches were circulating. Before the lifts closed I skied the Cirque and it appeared that cracks were propagating during my run. I immediately straight lined out of the bowl and the upper mountain soon closed. The avalanche rumors are running wild and it's safe to assume that additional avalanches happened at Jackson Hole today. The snow today was "upside down" and very heavy and slabby on the top. I am sure that we will learn more about the snow conditions on the evening avalanche report and we should all hope for the safe return of all skiers.

The Tram is Back

It was a deep day at Jackson Hole Mountain Resort and the first true powder day for the new tram.

More Jackson Hole Real Estate Info

I looked back at the number of properties sold in Teton County, WY over the past 2 years.

11/07-11/08 = 319 real estate transactions
11/06 - 11/07 = 630 real estate transactions

Looking at this trend, it's clear that the market has taken a big hit. I assume most real estate focused companies will have to continue to cut their expense structure dramatically in 2009 to survive. It will be interesting to watch how the continued real estate downturn and economic recession will impact the local real estate firms.

Real Estate Update

The general thesis addressed in the Jackson Hole Real Estate post was confirmed earlier this week when Real Estate of Jackson Hole announced that it would be restructuring and perhaps filing for bankruptcy. The JH News and Guide has an article today with an interview of the two majority owners.

The real estate transaction numbers listed in the post below are incorrect. In November 2008, 7 free standing houses were sold in Teton County. While not zero, this is a minuscule number and as pointed out in the News and Guide article, the real estate firms have a cost model built around processing significantly more transactions per month.

I believe that Real Estate of Jackson Hole ran into problems for a two reasons:

1. They are one of the largest players in the market and thus have a large number of fixed costs and a significant amount of employee overhead with their support staff

2. The majority of the company was recently purchased by new owners. They now need to service a significant amount of debt in addition to paying down monthly operational costs. Not to mention that the firm was sold at the peak of the bubble. Traditionally, a real estate firm is built from the ground up/grass roots level so servicing debt is not a large concern unless capital investments are made by the owners. It will be interesting to see how the downturn effects other brokers, but I would assume that most are still controlled by the original owners and that they do not carry a large amount of corporate debt.

Madoff and Jackson Hole

Anyone recognize the hat?

1 & 10%

1 = The total number of properties sold in November 2008 in Teton County, WY (Jackson Hole).
10% = The percentage of Teton County, WY residents who hold a real estate license (this is the number that is toss around...I do not know the accuracy).

The Jackson Hole real estate market has caught up with global economic forces. I would assume that December and January will have very weak real estate sales, perhaps not 1 or 2 properties but under 10 each month. Looking at this as a trend over the next quarter:

1. How will real estate professionals, title companies and mortgage brokers make money during the next 3 months? The expense strucutre of the firms are setup with an assumption of a minimum of 10-20 transacations for each company per month. Think about this, most compaines tied into the real estate market had ZERO revenue in November.

2. How will this trickle down to the local economy?

An interesting piece of data to watch will be the number of properties listed on the MLS that are owned by real estate agents. That will provide a glimpse into the financial stability of local agents and their long term view of market conditions. It would be interesting to compare the current number of properties listed and owned by agents to the same date last year, but I am not sure how you could find the old data.

The one property that sold in November was $7+ million dollar house. This was most likely an all cash deal which enabled the buyer to avoid the tightening credit market which will drastically effect the price of all properties in Jackson that are under $1.5 million. This is a topic for a future post.

Google Ads Are Back!

Bring on the $$$$

After the bailout - Who will buy the cars?

I am surprised that members in Congress and very few in the mainstream media are addressing the real question on the US auto bailout. Who is going to purchase their cars? Currently the legacy US automakers are losing the sales battle. We can dump billions of dollars in tax payer money into the companies but the problems will continue until they have a competitive product offering. Refinancing their massive debt and reducing labor costs are short term solutions, but the companies need to fundamentally restructure, change business models and revamp their entire product line before they can be successful. In my experience, this is a very difficult tasks, especially for a large enterprise.

Government and industry leaders need to step back and look at the full spectrum of the problem and stop politicking this issue as a “job saving” program. The issue is more complex than a short term job saving measure, if the plan is structured around this concern it will not address the core failure of Detroit and it will fail in the long run.

Finally, Valley Snow

We enjoyed eating Shrimp Fritters in Sevilla, Spain. The Spanish do not focus on presentation. The Cuban fritters use ground up shrimp and the Spanish version uses tiny whole shrimp fried live with egg batter. When eating the fritter you can see the whole shrimp and they are about 1/4 inch long.

I also had Cuban shrimp fitters in Florida.

Magic Kingdom

I made a trip to the Magic Kingdom in mid-November. The Magic Kingdom is the main park in Disney World and it has not changed much since I was a kid. I experienced a bit of daja-vu walking around, riding on Space Mountain, and soaking in the scene. I would not rush back to Disney world, but it would be fun to spend 2 days roaming around the parks with a few friends when our children are older.

The park was empty during the week before Thanksgiving and I was able to walk onto most rides (I only went into the park for 2 hours after a work conference ended). What amazed me was the large number of corrals to contain people during peak days. One could easily wait for 1 hour for a 2 minute ride. Don't go to Disney World during a peak holiday time - you will be overrun with other tourists.

Do you know who lives here?

Lack of Snow

We are currently experiencing a lack of snow in Jackson, WY. Current conditions as observed from my house:

- snow in the yard: 0
- snow at 7,500ft (Wilson faces): 1-2 inches
- snow at the Ski Area (Teton Village): man-made, with thin coverage above 8,000ft

We need another 20 inches to bring the backcountry into shape and about 4 feet for the resort to open more terrain. Keep your fingers crossed.