The Mission of the Wallowa Avalanche Center is to provide winter backcountry travelers with avalanche advisories, mountain weather forecasts, professional observations and avalanche safety education.
We begin avalanche forecasts in the fall after enough snow accumulates in the mountains for on-snow travel in the backcountry and continue them until early April. Typically, in early December, we begin forecasting Thursday through Sunday using the North America Danger Scale, followed by a General Avalanche Advisory on Monday. We do not issue a Danger Rating Monday through Wednesday, but we offer general advice. We also offer a variety of classroom and field-based educational programs, including instruction specifically aimed toward youth, backcountry skiers, snowmobilers, and professionals.
Victor McNeil, Director
victor@wallowaavalanchecenter.org
Victor began spending winters in the Wallowas in 2009, and has worked as a professional ski and mountain guide since then. As a native of Oregon, Victor graduated from Southern Oregon University, with a degree in Small Business Management. During the spring and summer, Victor guides in Alaska, Washington and Peru on high-altitude peaks and technical summits. As an IFMGA Guide, Victor has achieved the highest level of certification in Mountain Guiding, through the American Mountain Guides Association. Victor has completed a Level 3 Avalanche Certification through the American Avalanche Institute. La Grande, OR is home for Victor with his wife and 2 Golden Retrievers. When not out backcountry skiing, Victor is working on his snowmobile skills and how to develop better avalanche education for motorized backcountry users.
Rex Stanley, Development Director
rex@wallowaavalanchecenter.org
Rex hails from the small town of Baggs, WY, where he grew up snowmobiling with his family and learning to snowboard on the slopes of Steamboat Springs, CO. He attended Boise State University where he graduated with a degree in Business Management. Currently living in La Grande, OR, he is learning to explore the backcountry of the Wallowas and Elkhorns via his split-board and snowmobile. He hopes to increase the reach that the WAC has for all backcountry users, and build upon the growing backcountry culture here in Northeast Oregon. When the snow melts, he can be found hiking and riding his bike with his pup and wife. He also serves as board member of the local mountain biking chapter, Blue Mountain Singletrack Trails Club.
Michael Hatch, Avalanche Specialist
hatch@wallowaavalanchecenter.org
Michael Hatch grew up in Boise, ID and earned a B.S. in Resource Conservation/Wilderness Studies from the University of Montana, and an M.S. in Education from Eastern Oregon University. Currently, Hatch is the director of the Outdoor Adventure Program and instructor of Health and Human Performance for EOU. Hatch worked for over a decade as a backcountry ski guide in the Sawtooths and Wallowas. One of Hatch’s biggest passions is teaching avalanche courses, as an AIARE Course Leader for Level 1 and 2 classes. Hatch is a professional member of the American Avalanche Association and is also a board member for the WAC.
Kelly McNeil, Avalanche Specialist
Kelly grew up in Eastern Wyoming where she started exploring the Big Horn mountains on snowmobiles and dirt bikes at an early age. During that time, she also learned to ski in the South Dakota Black Hills. Kelly moved to Montana for her undergrad and was introduced to backcountry skiing. After many years of school and earning her Ph.D. from Oregon State University in 2009, she began a career as a professor at Eastern Oregon University, where much of her work focuses on public health and research in outdoor physical activity including the study of behavior in outdoor environments. Recently Kelly has started to assess how public health theories and practices can be utilized for avalanche education and forecasting. Since 2017, Kelly has helped organize and run operations at the Wallowa Avalanche Center, including teaching avalanche courses for both motorized and non-motorized users. In 2019 Kelly took her Professional Level 1 Avalanche Course and has also completed her Pro 2. Kelly is an AIARE Course Leader and also works for AIARE as an instructor. Kelly is a Professional Member of the American Avalanche Association, a guest host on the Avalanche Hour Podcast, and has also completed her AMGA Ski Guide Course. Over the past two years (2023, 2024) Kelly has presented her research at the International Snow Science Workshop in Bend, OR, and Tromso, Norway.
Caleb Merrill, Avalanche Specialist
Caleb Merrill grew up on the coast of Maine, eventually venturing west in search of more snowfall and vertical relief. He began his career in the snow and avalanche arena in 2006 as a ski patroller at Solitude in the Wasatch mountains of Utah. Early morning avalanche mitigation routes with explosives along exposed ridgelines are among the favored memories of this job. Caleb became a guide with Ruby Mountain Helicopter Skiing in 2014 and has enjoyed exploring the nooks and crannies of this hidden gem of a range while learning amongst some of the best guides in the industry. He is the creator, host, and producer of The Avalanche Hour Podcast- a side project aimed at creating more dialogue amongst the snow and avalanche community. Caleb is a certified ski guide through the AMGA. He completed an AIARE level 3 course in 2014 and is currently an AIARE course leader. Caleb and his wife are relocating to Enterprise, OR and we are lucky to have them in NE OR.
Sarah Jakober, Avalanche Specialist
Sarah grew up Darby, MT and earned a degree in Civil Engineering from Boise State University and a M.S. in Atmospheric Science from the University of Nevada, Reno. She has worked for the US Forest Service for the past decade as a wildland firefighter and has hopes of becoming a certified ski guide. She now calls La Grande OR a full time home and looks forward to exploring the range and spending time in the community.
Thomas Whipple, Avalanche Specialist
After an all-you-can-eat backcountry skiing mentality during college, often skiing in the Wallowas, Tom then spent a season interning at Silverton Mountain in Colorado and another guiding in the Purcells of interior BC. He later ski patrolled at Steven’s Pass and was a catski guide nearby for three years. Next, Tom moved on to teach AIARE courses in Northwest Montana as well as teaching and guiding in the Tetons. He now calls Northeastern Oregon home and loves exploring its many drainages by ski and by snowmachine. He has still never skied in his home state of Rhode Island (highest point at 812′ above sea level).
Tom maintains a WFR and has completed the AIARE Course Leader, Pro II, and AMGA Advanced Ski Guide courses. After using avalanche forecasts for over a decade, he is humbled to be able to contribute back to our collective understanding of snow. If you see him at a trailhead, come say hi.
Karen Morse, Avalanche Specialist
Karen grew up snowboarding in the Oregon Cascades and began working in the snow industry in 2013 in Tahoe, CA. For half of the year, she worked as an outdoor educator, leading multi-week rafting, backpacking, and mountaineering courses around Oregon and California, and in the winter she would migrate to the snowy Sierras. After three years of instructing and five years patrolling, she shifted her winter career out of bounds and in 2022 she began working as an assistant instructor with Idaho Panhandle Avalanche Center. Karen has since moved to Baker City, OR and spends the snowy months teaching AIARE courses and providing snowpack observations for the Wallowa Avalanche Center and guiding with ECMG.
When she isn’t sliding around on snow, she teaches swiftwater rescue and wilderness first responder courses and works as an EMT and rescue technician on wildland fires.
