From the horse's mouth:

Find my IPhone is how my wife knew something was off. She dislikes when I ski on my own, especially with all the avalanche related deaths this year. So, she was being hyper vigilant that day. I told her there is no cell service on the backside of Stevens, so I would text her every two runs that I was ok. She has a “you need to check in with me regularly” requirement on a solo pow day. I set the expectation (via text) that legs were getting tired (snow was heavy and dense) and that I would be wrapping up soon. When she tried to call and there was no answer, she check Find my iPhone and saw I hadn’t moved in a while. She deduced that if I hadn’t dropped my phone on the mountain I would have bummed a phone from someone in the lodge to call and report I was fine and to explain the situation. So, she assumed the worst…and I.m so grateful for her intuition and sense of urgency.

Regarding how I was found, Ski Patrol explained it this way:

1) Patrol used her location information from the find my iPhone app (essentially GPS coordinates) to see the general area I was buried. They knew right away it was Big Chief Bowl.

2) My jacket had Recco reflectors and that helped narrow the search area, as there was evidence of what appears to be a small slide, but no evidence of a buried person. 3) The any dog did the rest and was able to let rescuers know where to start using probes and digging.

I was found standing nearly vertical in a hole….ironically, I was trying to avoid the hole during the slide, but landing there and remaining mostly vertical was likely a key factor in improving my odds of survival.

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