Kzoo dad, sons survive CO avalanche

DENVER (NBC/WOOD) - A Kalamazoo father and his two sons are grateful to be alive after surviving an avalanche at Arapahoe Basin in Colorado.  
 
24 Hour News 8 has obtained a preliminary report from the Colorado Avalanche Information Center that states 15 people were on a run that was closed to the public when the avalanche happened just before 3 p.m. Feb. 16.
 
Among those 15 were Marty Hodges and his sons, Justin and Jordan. They were skiing on a mountain at a ski area outside Denver on a trail that was off limits to the public, but they were being guided by members of the ski patrol down the mountain.
 
"The ski patrol said, 'Avalanche!' He yelled it and I heard a very loud sound like a gun going off, and I looked up and there was this 2-foot river of snow coming at us," Marty told 24 Hour News 8.
 
"I look back and coming at me was just big old boulders," his 15-year-old son Justin told KUSA .

"It was really, really scary," 13-year-old Jordan told 24 Hour News 8. "It was like a tidal wave almost pulling you into the ocean."  
 
There was no time to react and the snow overwhelmed them.
 
"It hit me like instantly and I just immediately started rolling, and I was in a washing machine -- I couldn't see and filled my mouth and throat with snow," said Marty. "I ended up about a thousand feet down the hill."  

Marty said the trip lasted only a few minutes.   
 
"I'm claustrophobic, so I'm thinking this is the worst way to die and I'm going to die this way," Marty told 24 Hour News 8. "My throat was plugged, I couldn't breathe, I couldn't see."  
 
After the avalanche stopped, Marty said he was able to dig a hole so he could breathe -- and then his first thoughts were for his two sons.  

He said he quickly saw Justin -- his older son who had figured out a way to get on top of the wall of snow and ride at least a part of the way down on top of the avalanche. It took a little longer to find Jordan -- but the younger son eventually raised both of his arms out of the snow pile he was in.  
 
The snowwall the Hodges lived through was 330-feet wide and up to 12-feet deep. The snowpack was so hard, Marty told 24 Hour News 8, it took rescuers nearly an hour to dig him out from a few feet of the snow.
 
"We went to the ER and everyone was casual about it. They were like, 'We don't actually see people from avalanches. We see corpses,'" Marty told 24 Hour News 8.
 
No one died in this avalanche. The report said only one person was buried by snow.  

Marty, Jordan and Justin escaped the tidal wave of snow with only a twisted knee and a handful of bruises. Justin said his throat is still sore because of all the snow that he swallowed.
 
"It didn't even seem real at the time. It seemed like I was watching a video," said Justin.
 
A few days and a few hundred miles later back in West Michigan, the three say they realize just how lucky they are to be home.
 
The three said they can't wait to go skiing again, but say Marty's wife, the boys' mom, might want them to hold off for a while.

24 Hour News 8's Dani Carlson contributed to this report.