{"id":29589,"date":"2024-01-23T18:45:16","date_gmt":"2024-01-23T18:45:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/doctor-killed-in-avalanche-south-of-telluride\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T06:59:46","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T06:59:46","slug":"doctor-killed-in-avalanche-south-of-telluride","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/doctor-killed-in-avalanche-south-of-telluride\/","title":{"rendered":"Doctor killed in avalanche south of Telluride"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><figure class=\"wp-block-image naviga-inline-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/imengine.public.prod.dur.navigacloud.com\/?uuid=ae42a35b-cc30-517b-9239-4facfa5f43ad&amp;function=cover&amp;type=preview&amp;source=false&amp;width=2000\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1500\" alt=\"Members of San Miguel County Search and Rescue on a recovery mission for a 67-year-old man who died Monday in an avalanche south of Ophir. (Courtesy of San Miguel Sheriff's Office)\" class=\"naviga-image\" loading=\"lazy\"><figcaption><span class=\"caption\">Members of San Miguel County Search and Rescue on a recovery mission for a 67-year-old man who died Monday in an avalanche south of Ophir. (Courtesy of San Miguel Sheriff's Office)<\/span><span class=\"credit\">cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p><p>A 67-year-old doctor and longtime resident of Ophir died Monday in an avalanche near his hometown, which is nestled in the San Juan Mountains south of Telluride.<\/p>\n<p>The San Miguel County Sheriff\u2019s Office identified the person as Peter Harrelson, who for years worked as a family physician, according to multiple websites.<\/p>\n<p>It is the first recorded avalanche death so far this season in Colorado, according to the Colorado Avalanche Information Center.<\/p>\n<p><figure class=\"wp-block-image naviga-inline-image naviga-align-left alignleft\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/imengine.public.prod.dur.navigacloud.com\/?uuid=49986842-cfbc-55b1-9b43-0e40a58c9058&amp;function=cover&amp;type=preview&amp;source=false&amp;width=2000\" width=\"1536\" height=\"2048\" alt=\"Members of San Miguel County Search and Rescue on a recovery mission for a 67-year-old man who died Monday in an avalanche south of Ophir. (Courtesy of San Miguel Sheriff's Office)\" class=\"naviga-image\" loading=\"lazy\"><figcaption><span class=\"caption\">Members of San Miguel County Search and Rescue on a recovery mission for a 67-year-old man who died Monday in an avalanche south of Ophir. (Courtesy of San Miguel Sheriff's Office)<\/span><span class=\"credit\">cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p><p>Harrelson set out on a backcountry trip about noon Monday in the Waterfall Creek area south of Ophir, said Sheriff\u2019s Office spokeswoman Susan Lilly.<\/p>\n<p>Law enforcement was notified at 7:40 p.m. that Harrelson had not returned from his outing, which set off a search and rescue effort.<\/p>\n<p>The search extended into the night without locating the man. Rescuers resumed their search Tuesday morning with snowmobiles, air resources and ground crews.<\/p>\n<p>Lilly said Harrelson\u2019s body was found soon after a helicopter was launched.<\/p>\n<p>Rescue workers were in the process of bringing the man down as of 11 a.m. Tuesday.<\/p>\n<p>Lilly asked people to avoid the area, largely because of the dangerous avalanche conditions.<\/p>\n<p>The avalanche occurred on a northwest aspect below tree line, where the avalanche danger was listed as \u201cmoderate,\u201d according to a preliminary report by the CAIC.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"naviga-map\"><iframe src=\"https:\/\/maps.google.com\/maps?q=37.846366753076%2C-107.83127693967&amp;z=15&amp;output=embed\" width=\"100%\" height=\"400\" style=\"border:0;\" allowfullscreen loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Map\"><\/iframe><\/figure>\n<p>The San Miguel Sheriff\u2019s Office initially reported it was a skier who became trapped, but the CAIC later clarified it was a snowboarder.<\/p>\n<p>The Sheriff\u2019s Office expressed its condolences to the Harrelson\u2019s family and friends. It also expressed its appreciation to the search and rescue members who risked their lives searching for the skier.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOur team trains for this kind of thing, and it\u2019s always difficult when there\u2019s not a good outcome and the patient is deceased,\u201d Lilly said.<\/p>\n<p><em id=\"emphasis-5669130caa5805237e8b7cca0a307df6\"><a href=\"mailto:shane@durangoherald.com\">shane@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<p><figure class=\"wp-block-image naviga-inline-image naviga-align-left alignleft\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/imengine.public.prod.dur.navigacloud.com\/?uuid=bb9473e6-5b17-58df-9fe5-768a00a2b14b&amp;function=cover&amp;type=preview&amp;source=false&amp;width=2000\" width=\"1380\" height=\"1485\" alt=\"The San Miguel Sheriff\u2019s Office and San Miguel Search and Rescue search for a backcountry skier who was later confirmed to have died in an avalanche near Ophir. (Courtesy of San Miguel Sheriff\u2019s Office)\" class=\"naviga-image\" loading=\"lazy\"><figcaption><span class=\"caption\">The San Miguel Sheriff\u2019s Office and San Miguel Search and Rescue search for a backcountry skier who was later confirmed to have died in an avalanche near Ophir. (Courtesy of San Miguel Sheriff\u2019s Office)<\/span><span class=\"credit\">cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Snowboarder was reported missing Monday night; rescue workers found body Tuesday morning<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":29590,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[377,120,28,1561,97],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-29589","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-avalanche-landslide","tag-colorado","tag-headlines","tag-san-miguel-county","tag-telluride"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29589","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29589"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29589\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":80794,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29589\/revisions\/80794"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29590"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29589"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29589"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29589"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=29589"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}