For the second straight year, a skier with Jackson ties has been inducted into the National Ski and Snowboard Hall of Fame.

The late Doug Coombs, a renowned skier, climber and former Tetons mountain guide, was inducted Friday into the Ski and Snowboard Hall of Fame.

Those who knew Coombs celebrated his induction into the Hall of Fame.

“I think it’s totally worthy,” said close friend Rick Hunt, of Jackson, who had known Coombs since the early 1980s. “It’s the Hall of Fame and he was one of the greatest skiers out there. I think it’s appropriate he was inducted. It’s an honor to have known him and been one of his friends.”

Coombs, 48, helped open up controlled access to Jackson’s backcountry, won the World Extreme Skiing Championships in 1991 and 1993 and was a member of several USA Powder 8 Championship teams. Coombs was a pioneer of extreme skiing in Valdez, Alaska, where he made more than 300 first descents. He founded Valdez Heli-Ski Guides and ran Steep Skiing Camps Worldwide.

Coombs was originally from Massachusetts, went to college at Montana State University and moved to Jackson in the 1980s before his death more than three years ago.

Coombs died April 3, 2006, after slipping on rocks over cliffs near the La Grave resort in the French Alps, where he had established a guiding business. He was trying to assist friend Chad VanderHam, who had fallen in the same location. VanderHam also died.

Coombs was a Jackson Hole resident at the time of his death. A memorial was held June 25, 2006 at Jackson Hole Mountain Resort, drawing several hundred people.

“He was at the top of the pile as someone everyone looked up to,” Hunt said. “He represented Jackson on the world stage of skiing. He represented all the great aspects that Jackson has to offer.”

Coombs conceived and operated the first commercial helicopter skiing business in Alaska’s Chugach Mountains near Valdez in 1993. He became a certified International Federation of Mountain Guides Associations guide, guided the first clients off the Grand Teton for Exum, and ran his steep skiing camps in Switzerland, France and Greenland.

The movie Steep, the first mainstream film about the history of what’s known as big-mountain skiing, virtually became an epitaph for Coombs.

Coombs was born in Boston and grew up in Bedford, Mass. He spent much of his youth skiing in New Hampshire and Vermont before moving west.

After four years racing on the Montana State University ski team, Coombs graduated with a geology degree and moved to Jackson, where he worked as a geologist in the summer and a ski technician in the winters. He soon became a fixture of the extreme skiing scene here.

Coombs’ induction marks the second straight year Jackson has been represented in the Ski and Snowboard Hall of Fame. Jackson ski pioneer Bill Briggs, the first to ski the 13,370-foot Grand Teton, was inducted last year.

Coombs is joined in this year’s class by Paul Robbins, Jack Benedick, Chris Waddell, Sarah Will, Stu Campbell, Sepp Kober and Ansten Samuelstuen.