The snowboarding community is mourning the devastating news that Ueli Kestenholz has died in an avalanche. From Switzerland, Kestenholz won bronze at the 1998 Winter Olympics at Nagano and was a part of the inaugural event. He was 50 years old and a father of two.
According to reports, he was buried by the avalanche around noon in the Loetschental region of Canton Valais in southern Switzerland. According to Swiss Info, it took place on the eastern slope of the Hockuchriz, at an altitude of about 2,400 metres.
“The skier was able to get himself to safety,” police said in a news release. “As for the snowboarder, he was buried and was freed by his colleague and the Valais Cantonal Rescue Organization (OCVS), with the support of three Air Zermatt helicopters.”
Kestenholz was transported by helicopter to a hospital, first in Visp and then in Sion, where he died. An avalanche is a sudden rush of snow, ice, rock, or debris moving down a mountainside. It can happen naturally or because of human activity.
Ueli Kestenholz
Kestenholz was first a skier, then found snowboarding when he was 14.
"I skateboarded, I was a windsurfer, but I only skied in the winter, and on two planks," Kestenholz saidin an interview, per SwissSki.
"Snowboarding offered the opportunity to experience my favorite feeling, gliding sideways, even in winter."
Along with his Olympic bronze, he has earned two gold medals at the 2003 and 2004 X Games and has a total of 14 World Cup victories.
Kestenholz's friends have been sharing tributes to his life. His fellow Olympian Seth Wescott shared a gallery of photos with a touching tribute. He said they met in 2003 and competed together over the years, and Kestenholz invited him to Alaska.
"In those years, I witnessed Ueli take flight in his early experiences with speed riding, and I watched him have the most horrific fall I have ever witnessed, tomahawking 1400 vertical feet only to get up convinced that he should go ride an even more consequential line," he wrote.
"I only ever saw him scared one time. When what he assumed was going to be a low elevation basket ride ala @travisrice, turned into him 1000 feet above the valley floor and getting dropped off right next to me, no harness, just his gloved fingers through the gaps in the basket, board on, trying to peel him off from the rotor wash."
Rest in peace.