Associated Press
MAZAMA — A 100-foot-long snowslide closed the North Cascades Highway on Monday but apparently no one was caught in the avalanche, authorities said.
Witnesses had reported a 1972 brown van had entered the area at about the time of the slide. But by 7:30 p.m., state Department of Transportation spokesman Jeff Adamson said state troopers believed the van made it through.
The avalanche, estimated at 30 feet high, blocked Highway 20 at milepost 161, about two miles east of Washington Pass, he said.
DOT immediately dispatched a front-end loader and other equipment to try to clear a path, but Adamson said the road could remain closed until today.
Traffic was being turned back at Newhalem on the west and Mazama on the east.
The avalanche was reported about 4:30 p.m. Monday.
The North Cascades Highway reopened for summer traffic on May 7, in one of the latest openings in the scenic route’s 30-year history.
Heavy snowfall closes the highway nearly every winter. State DOT plows normally open the 5,477-foot elevation Washington Pass route by late April but this spring has been abnormally chilly.
Adamson said earlier the North Cascades received 10 times more snow this winter compared with last year, when drought conditions allowed workers to reopen March 22.
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