Avalanche Risk

[Montana St Alum]

True, the "why" is critical.

[Krummholz]

You can also go to Avalanche.org find your mountain range. I’m in the Front Range, here is our forecast. It looks like one of those “You should have been here yesterday!” forecasts.

[joeatomictoad]

I got the chance to thumb through some of the learning content at the "Know Before You Go" website.

I really like the concept of, if you're around the ocean you should know about riptides, so if you're around snowy mountains you should know about avalanches. What a novel concept.

Definitely expanded my horizons on several concepts. The one that really surprised me was that European ungroomed is uncontrolled terrain and basically considered backcountry. This makes me so proud to be [a North] American!

They did a good job of balancing awareness, keeping attention, and not getting too terribly technical. Really good primer for getting the ignorant (like myself) a little less ignorant.

[Stephen]

@joeatomictoad, great post, I had not seen the Know Before You Go website before.
https://kbyg.org/

Video from above website. Choked me up…

[lowangle al]

I'm kinda claustrophobic and giving some serious thought to having my last breath squeezed out of me and not being able to move a muscle until I die cuts down on my cheating.

Testimonials and case studies should be part of an introductory avy course, like those car crash videos they made us watch as part of driver training in high school back in the 70s.

[lowangle al]

To add to my above post, don't forget that you might also be suffering from a traumatic injury at the same time.

Be safe out there.

[fgd135]

Colorado backcountry skier killed in avalanche Christmas eve:
https://avalanche.state.co.us/caic/acc/ ... iew=public

[jyw5]

Colorado backcountry skier killed in avalanche Christmas eve:
https://avalanche.state.co.us/caic/acc/ ... iew=public

its sad, but there is the problem again...

they continue to label it as an accident. It's an incident. Every time they call it an accident, they are implying that it was just that...an accident, when in actuality, these situations can be avoided and in order to raise awareness, it shouldn't be marginalized and called accidents. These situations should be better worded. And I think a closing statement should also include that skiing in the backcountry has inherent risks and INCIDENTS of avalanches resulting in death can be reduced but not 100% avoidable.

and using the driving analogy doesn't work because people have to drive to go places and work for a living...skiing is voluntary, but in most situations, driving is not. that's why motor vehicle collisions can be described loosely as accidents despite the inherent dangers.

[joeatomictoad]

they continue to label it as an accident. It's an incident.

Incident vs. accident is an interesting point. Given the mass public distribution for these types of communications, I presume the verbiage selected has little to do with actual meaning, and more to do with marketing + politics. Hoping to be wrong.

[Stephen]

@jyw5 turns on the 150 watt lightbulb in the room.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/accident
ac·ci·dent

Full Definition of accident
1a : an unforeseen and unplanned event or circumstance
Their meeting was an accident.
b : lack of intention or necessity : CHANCE
They met by accident rather than by design.
2a : an unfortunate event resulting especially from carelessness or ignorance
was involved in a traffic accident

The problem with the word “accident” is that it can imply that something happened by chance and that the affected party had no agency in the outcome.
At the same time, much of the definition could apply to an avalanche incident: unplanned, lack of intention or necessity, unfortunate, careless, ignorance.
This is not to imply that all who are killed in an avalanche are ignorant or careless.

The words we use are important and shape our thinking.
I agree that it might be better to use sharper language when reporting avalanches.
Might be hard on those close to the event, but also might help prevent future incidents.

Just for context:
Surfer recently killed in shark attack on California coast. Pretty much the only way to avoid being a shark victim is to not go in the water — to not surf.
On the other hand, as skiers, we have the blessing of being able to see and understand avalanche risk IF we have the knowledge (real knowledge, not hearsay and rules of thumb).

This is not cheery stuff, and is also very low probability, based on total number of skier hours, worldwide.
But the consequences are so devastating that it seems important to confront reality and take responsible action.
It’s my hope that none of us will be one of the dozens of people making up this seasons avalanche statistics.