Snowboarder disappears into rare 'snownado' in Alberta

April 11 (UPI) -- A meteorologist who spotted a rare "snownado" at the at an Alberta ski run shot video of his friend snowboarding through the white whirlwind.

Brett Soderholm posted a video to YouTube showing his friend, Justin Buss, snowboarding through the swirling snownado -- a rare whirlwind formation also known as a snow devil -- at the Lake Louise Ski Resort in Alberta.

"There was a crowd of about five people behind me and I could hear them say, 'That guy's going for it! He's crazy!'" Soderholm told CTV News.

Soderholm said he skied through the snownado after Buss, an experience he described as "painful."

"There were fierce winds swirling around me with little pieces of ice chucked up against my face," he said.

Soderholm said snow devils are quite rare and occur when winds blowing different directions create a small vortex.

"It had just snowed the day before so the air picked up some of that powder, spiraled around and grew a lot more than I expected it to," he said.

He said the snownado only lasted for a few moments.

"I felt pretty lucky to have been there at that time," he said. "It's a very rare phenomenon."