Yeah, we knew exactly where he was the entire time. His feet were actually poking out the whole time - which he didn't actually move until about 2 min into the climb, so we first thought he broke his back or was passed out.
Anyway, it was just a matter of getting up to him. I was above and went to ski around but came out way below where Matt was. I kept my skis on and made it up probably 30 feet from where I was lowest, and matt made it about 50.. this is in 3 minutes. We were both completely exhausted and covered in sweat afterwards - it's really really really hard to get up hill in that much snow, even if it's not that steep. Right at that last second Matt had already reached chris' feet with his pole, but he came to a steeper section where it seemed to just be a wall of snow. he was so close and that's when he started to freak out saying he couldn't make it. Every time he dug to get closer, he just sank deeper. I yelled at him to start just digging straight into the wall, and he did and eventually reached chris' body.
But yeah, I agree about the avi gear and never being too prepared, but again, none of that stuff would have helped us in the situation. What we learned in the situation was to always have spotters close by at the top or below cliff drops and such. Matt dropped the cliff right before and bounced right out so it was within both of their capabilities it was just that Chris pitched a little forward off the take off and the height of the drop was such that he got much further forward by the bottom and went down head first.
