Buried In An Avalanche For 4 Hours — His Wife’s ‘Find My iPhone’ Check Saved His Life

March 6, 2026

A Washington man is calling his survival nothing short of a miracle after spending more than four hours buried beneath avalanche snow at a ski resort — and crediting his wife’s intuition, a bit of technology, and his faith for saving his life.

Michael Harris / Photos via Fox13 Seattle

Michael Harris had skied the slopes at Stevens Pass countless times before. But on this particular day, the mountain had something very different in store.

Harris was skiing through Big Chief Bowl when the snow suddenly broke loose beneath him.

“Because I was on skis I got caught between two slabs,” Harris said.

Realizing he had triggered an avalanche, he tried desperately to free himself, using a swimming motion to stay above the moving snow. But the powerful slide was too strong.

He managed to avoid crashing into a boulder before sliding into what he later described as a small “snow hole.” The avalanche quickly buried him.

Harris was trapped — unable to move his arms, unable to reach the Apple Watch on his wrist or the iPhone tucked in his jacket.

But then something incredible happened.

His phone began ringing.

“Signed, sealed and delivered right here over my heart,” Harris said of the phone in his jacket. “My wife was calling me. I felt it vibrate. I could hear it ring… yet my hand couldn’t get to it.”

Buried beneath several feet of snow, with no way to signal for help, Harris began thinking about the people he loved most.

Down in that dark pocket beneath the avalanche, he prayed.

“I’m a religious guy,” he said. “I said, ‘God, I’m in trouble. I don’t know if anyone is going to know where I’m at, but I can’t get out of this on my own.’”

Meanwhile, miles away, his wife Penny suddenly felt something wasn’t right.

“You get a feeling something’s just not right,” she said. “I followed my intuition.”

She opened the Find My iPhone app and checked her husband’s location. Then she checked again.

It hadn’t moved.

After realizing his phone had been in the exact same spot for hours, Penny contacted ski patrol and began driving toward Stevens Pass herself.

When she arrived, rescuers used the phone’s location to pinpoint exactly where Harris was buried.

As the search began, Penny braced herself for the worst.

“I was sitting there, just waiting to find my husband, anticipating the retrieval of a body,” she said.

But rescuers soon made a discovery that stunned everyone.

Harris was still alive.

Despite being buried for more than four hours, he had an air pocket roughly the size of a beach ball in front of his face — just enough space to keep breathing.

With the precise location from his phone, ski patrol was able to dig him out.

Harris later regained consciousness in the back of an ambulance. He had severe hypothermia, a lung full of fluid, and a broken leg.

Considering what he had endured, he says the outcome feels almost unbelievable.

“I would not have believed this story if I hadn’t lived through it myself,” Harris said. “I’ve been blessed. I have a second chance. I thought I was leading a good life, but I want to lead an even better one.”

Harris spent five days recovering in the hospital before finally returning home to his family.

His daughter, still shaken by the ordeal, described the terrifying moment she learned her father was missing.

“The first words my mom said were, ‘Your dad is missing,’” she wrote. “My heart sank… I felt like I was going to vomit.”

But after what felt like an eternity, ski patrol radioed the words the family had been desperately praying to hear — he had been found.

“It is a true miracle that he survived,” she wrote. “I have been thanking God since the incident that he is still here with us.”

At the hospital, staff began referring to Harris by a new nickname.

“The miracle avalanche man.”

For Harris, there’s no doubt who deserves the biggest credit.

“She’s the best,” he said of Penny. “She’s my lifesaver.”

After surviving something so few people ever do, Harris says he’s now focused on what matters most — family, faith, and making the most of the second chance he’s been given.