Comments on: Avy Education: Motivation

By: Bill

Bill — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 08:06:20 +0000

More good stuff Andy. My philosophy is that one has to collect evidence from multiple sources to be safe. The prep work before hand – what’s been going on with the weather, temperatures fluctuations, any recent rain then freezing? What’s being reported? Things like that merely give one a starting point.

People who stop there or rely on “I have a beacon” as their green light are quite frankly far more dangerous in my opinion.

What’s important to me is the real time assessment at every stage of the climb. How does the snow feel; hollow, consolidated, compacted, unconsolidate? Is it being reactive in any way? If so how and to what degree? Can I feel any layers when probing with my pole? How does it react when skiining vs when booting? Can I see any natural activity? How recent? How did it start (slab release, rock-fall release, point release?

How is it reacting around trees and rocks while on approach?

What’s the temperature forceast for the night and day? Is it warming up faster than expected. Any sunball or pinwheel activity?

What’s the wind been doing? Are we leeward or winward? Any loading? How extensive?

The forecasts help us understand what someone else observed. The pits help understand what’s going on deeper down. A Rutscblock test gives a beter indication of how the snow will react to a skier/boarder (in my opinion).

All of these data points work together to form the foundation for safe decisions. The beacon, probe, and shovel are there for when we get it terribly wrong – which like a PLBs and Airbags – you hope you never have to use them.

Knowledge is a safety tool. Keep sharing it.

By: Jonathan Lemkin

Jonathan Lemkin — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 22:36:27 +0000

Took my Avy 1 last year. I know enough now to be dangerous. It’s a start. I’d have to dig 50 more pits with people who could check my work before I’d claim to truly be able to read one. What it did help me with was terrain choice, angle and aspect. I find I’m making decisions on the way up in terms of where I want to be on the way down and when.

By: Chad

Chad — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 19:04:07 +0000

You’re braver than I am. If I see cracks of any kind I’m simply turning around or finding someplace else to ski. And I’d feel uncomfortable resting my laurels on the 60-90% rule described above. But I agree my confidence level would rise exponentially if I were digging multiples and finding complimentary results. Then again digging three or four snowpits, especially if your spending 20 minutes on each doesn’t seem practical for daytrippers climbing 4000 feet.

By: Andy

Andy — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 17:39:56 +0000

Chad,

Brian Tremper says one good snowpit from a representative spot showing stable snow has a 60% chance of being right. That’s 60 percent as in just barely better than a coin toss. So I’d say you’re right to be wary of what a pit tells you.

I’m mostly using pits as a correlative tool–trying to link what I see in a pit with other observations. Ie, if you see bona fide shooting cracks (not just crust collapse), what does that look like when you run a compression test?

Incidentally, Tremper’s confidence rate goes up to 90% for “several” good snowpits in representative areas.

By: Chad

Chad — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 19:53:29 +0000

Excellent points Andy. It’s a tipsy line to draw conclusions and write about avalanche safety when so few of us are experts and feel good about making constructive assessments that will ultimately determine the fate or outcome of you, your partner, or worse yet, someone you don’t know hanging onto every word you write herein. I think we all understand you assume no responsibility and every one of your readers need to carefully plan their own trips and second guess the opinions of just one man. That’s why it’s important to listen to everyone, novice and seasoned skier alike, to be sure there is a positive and fun outcome for everyone involved. Often times a novice with good instincts is a better asset to a group that an seasoned pro with a set agenda. One of the things I’ve noticed you’re doing more of, at least from what I can tell in your writing, is that you’re digging more snow pits these days. I’m certainly not against these, the more information you have the better, but rarely do we dig snow pits on the aspect we tend to ski, and even if we do we almost never assess the snow pack on the most dangerous part of that aspect. It’s just not practical and it’s dangerous in itself. Since snow pack varies, even within a few feet, I never put too much emphasis on a pit evaluation, especially since the interpretation of it is somewhat subjective to begin with. I’ve always felt a compression test, coupled with a proper and premeditated route selection, and most importantly, an agreement and consensus of that plan within the group is the best safety precaution a back country skier has. This of course is second to having done your weather analysis and reaching an agreement on what you might expect the conditions to be like prior to even beginning your ascent. In this way, we prepare ourselves, packing gear to deal with the plausible, often times, and thankfully never using it. For instance, I hope I never to have to use my beacon. And it’s a shame the industry is capitalizing on fear, charging upwards of $500 just to get into the game. I don’t believe beacons safe lives, but I wouldn’t want a partner who didn’t carry one either. How’s that for a contradiction? Then again, snow science, in it’s interpretive nature, can be full of contradictions. There’s always an unknown risk.