Katherine “Kasha” Rigby, a prominent US competition and telemark skier, killed in an avalanche in Kosovo on Tuesday, according to Ski magazine. She was 54.
I so saddened by the news this morning of l Kasha Rigby’s death in an avalanche. She was an inspiration to me and the reason I learned how to telemark. She made it seem fierce, strong & elegant all at the same time. I never met her, but I thought of her often as an icon. 💔⛷️
— Anne Dowling (@sagrantinogirl) February 14, 2024
At around 2:30 p.m., a small avalanche hit the Ski Centre in Brezovica, Kosovo. Rigby was swept off the trail and into the trees. According to officials, the avalanche was around 82 feet broad and 32 feet high.
She was travelling with her fiancé, Magnus Wolfe Murray, who found her 20 seconds after the avalanche hit her. He quickly tried CPR to save her. However, she perished seconds after the avalanche struck. She experienced internal bleeding in her chest as well as lung injury.
According to officials, the event was caused by Rigby dropping in at the top of the run, as reported by Ski magazine. According to EuroNews.Albania, the Kosovo Mountain Search and Rescue Service received a call to respond to the location of the avalanche known as “Eagle’s Nest” – a high-risk area for these natural disasters.
A few days before her death, the well-known skier posted a photo from her vacation and mentioned the perilous circumstances at the ski area. “Sideways rain, a big melt, and winds too high to run lifts, doesn’t keep these skiers and sledders off the t-bar and slope,” she said in her farewell Instagram post. She was in Kosovo for the Tour de Piste, an event in which expert skiers are recruited to explore the obscure ski routes of popular ski resorts.
Rigby was born in Stowe, Vermont in 1970. She learnt to ski as soon as she could walk and started practicing on the East Coast slopes. She began telemark skiing as a toddler.
Telemark skiing combines Alpine and Nordic skiing, with the skier “bending their knees every time they have to turn.” The heel is connected to the front of the binding by a hinged cable,” according to the Olympics official website.
At 22, she relocated to Crested Butte, Colorado, to compete in telemark racing and extreme skiing. Rigby, according to Ski Magazine, transformed the sport “with her high-speed, hard-driving style.”
She joined the North Face Team in 1995 and has skied extensively in the United States, Canada, South America, New Zealand, Russia, Asia, Europe, India, and the Middle East. During a North Face expedition, she skied the highest peak in Siberia, which borders Mongolia, Kyrgyzstan, and China. She also skied Mongolia’s Five Holy Peaks.
She achieved history as one of three American women to ski an 8000-meter peak, along with Hilaree Nelson and Willie Benegas, on Cho Oyu in the Himalayas. In 2015, she finished second in the National Geographic series Ultimate Survival Alaska.
Rigby had recently halted her skiing outings to focus on earthquake aid. She worked in Kathmandu, Nepal, and Turkey with her fiancé Wolfe.
She also helped with the Rohingya refugee issue and worked for the World Food Programme in Bangladesh for three years. Her fiancé survives her. The two planned to marry in September.
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