Avalanche season in Colorado off to a deadly start Colorado’s avalanche conditions worsened in late December, and slides have already killed four people. The first avalanche death of the season was a solo skier who was buried in a slide near Crested Butte in an area called Friendly Finish. A few days later, two backcountry skiers were killed in an avalanche northwest of Silverton. And just this past Saturday, a slide occurred on Berthoud Pass that claimed the fourth victim of what is quickly becoming a historically deadly avalanche season for the state. There were six avalanche deaths across the state in the whole 2019/20s20 snow season.