Solving for Z | A Calculus of Risk

[jono]

Speaking for myself, I'm pretty sure I would have bailed. Like I said, I am notoriously chicken. We did a weekend hut trip to Caribou Lodge, just a bit north of Schweitzer. Hiked up Caribou Ridge and two of us dug a hasty pit. It was, at best, sketchy. I told my buddies I was out and skied back down the ridge line. Some of them, in turn, skied a lee slope that I wouldn't have gone near. I was perfectly content going back the way I came, they were happy they skied what they did. I have no embarrassment over my decision and I'm just glad they got out safely. In my opinion, they just got lucky. That was the last hut trip I have done and I wouldn't go with most of those guys again, after seeing their decision making in those conditions.

If you don't mind saying, which direction did they drop in? Not looking to repeat it it anything, my memory of the (late season) cornice on that ridge's west side just has me curious.

[GoldMember]

If you don't mind saying, which direction did they drop in? Not looking to repeat it it anything, my memory of the (late season) cornice on that ridge's west side just has me curious.

This was in mid-March. They dropped into the northeast side of the ridge, near the top. The wind had been blasting out of the SW for 12 hours and was still blowing strong when we got up there. We dug the pit just over the ridge line on the north side and it went after 3 wrist taps. Maybe we just hit the hot spot but that fact it didn't go on those guys was amazing to me. They were in denial to the conditions that me and my buddy found and just went. One wrong hit and it should've gone.

There really wasn't much of a cornice on it and typically it would be on the northeast side since the prevailing wind is out of the SW. I can't remember if it was something of a low tide that year (five years ago??) but the lee side was definitely wind-loaded.

[plugboots]

I'm pretty sure he stopped there at least to communicate with whomever he said 'clear' to. Then there was some editing and he started again about 40' to the left. He seemed to be entering a completely separate chute when it broke.

Yes, I see that now.

[goldenboy]

Definitely listen to the podcast after watching this video.

[kevino]

Definitely listen to the podcast after watching this video.

I would echo this. It helps address a lot of the speculation in the earlier part of this thread.

[old goat]

Or accept the video for what it is--an entertainment video, not an educational one.

[jono]

This was in mid-March. They dropped into the northeast side of the ridge, near the top. The wind had been blasting out of the SW for 12 hours and was still blowing strong when we got up there. We dug the pit just over the ridge line on the north side and it went after 3 wrist taps. Maybe we just hit the hot spot but that fact it didn't go on those guys was amazing to me. They were in denial to the conditions that me and my buddy found and just went. One wrong hit and it should've gone.

There really wasn't much of a cornice on it and typically it would be on the northeast side since the prevailing wind is out of the SW. I can't remember if it was something of a low tide that year (five years ago??) but the lee side was definitely wind-loaded.

Thanks! It's been some years--I had to check the map to remember the cornice I was thinking of was on the north face of the ridge from the cabin. But it captured our attention so thoroughly (as in: kept us Well back from the edge) that the "adventurous" on our trip We're the ones that skied the ridge back from the summit. The rest boot-packed the last 50' or so. /drift

[cravenmorhead]

I just got to listening to the podcast. I struggle with a couple of ideas that Zahan was putting out there, specifically (1) that you can't get away from luck being a significant factor in who lives and who dies in backcountry skiing, and (2) making a habit of charging risky lines in the backcountry to the point where you die doing it can be an acceptable risk/reward ratio if it allows you to live a full enough life.

As for (1), I think that's true if you're charging big lines, but at the same time, you could meadow skip and put yourself in situations where it's basically only bad decisions that kill you, not luck. As for (2), maybe it's just a difference in mindset, as Zahan argues. For me, it's "just skiing," and it's unequivocally not worth dying for. I suppose that's not necessarily the case for everyone.

[wstdeep]

Human nature is to push and push until failure, learn and do it again. We are hard wired in that manner and without it we would still be living in the jungle and eating bananas. As skiers from day one we try, fall get up, fall again and continue to learn and improve in that manner. The problem is the back country doesn't work that way and sometimes the fail means serious injury or death. When that happens getting up to do it again may or cannot be an option.

I am friends with a dozen or so full time guides who guide in the Tetons and AK and have casual friendships with maybe a dozen more. After having a close call last year I had a sit-down with myself and gave myself a good ass chewing as well as really dug into my own incident to get the answer to why it had happened. Part of my reflection involved going thru all of the accidents here (Tetons) or in AK that I had been directly involved with or had knowledge of with enough details to reach some sort of conclusion . As I went down the list I realized that every single one of the professionals (in the first group) that I know had had an incident where either they or a client had been involved in a slide of some magnitude. The sum total of days afield for that group easily numbers in the tens of thousands. The incidents total maybe 20. There is a bit of a numbers game involved here. If all you do is meadow skip you likely will never have an issue but spending time in high risk/reward areas tips the board considerably and all the data in the world that indicates that conditions are good to go can be skewed by something as insignificant and unnoticed as a bathtub ring of clouds that changes the snows surface creating an area of surface hoar that only exists for 300 ft of elevation on a 4500 ft Alaskan face, gets buried by the next storm and waits for someone to ski over it tipping the balance. A small area of shade on an otherwise sunny slope or a shallow area of rocks that are growing depth hoar can be completely unnoticed from the surface. I don't take comfort from this but in the end I realize that if your playing the high end game even the best players can get caught out... Even making what seem to be all the right plays. The goal is to make that margin of "bad luck" as tiny as possible...at least for me.

And to be clear I never used any of this to give myself a pass...I fucked up, I hope to never do it again.

Linking in the hope that at least one person reads and learns something that helps in their growth and maybe see's a red light blinking when it matters and pulls back.

https://www.tetongravity.com/forums/...Clipped-almost

[nest]

Human nature is to push and push until failure, learn and do it again. We are hard wired in that manner and without it we would still be living in the jungle and eating bananas. As skiers from day one we try, fall get up, fall again and continue to learn and improve in that manner. The problem is the back country doesn't work that way and sometimes the fail means serious injury or death. When that happens getting up to do it again may or cannot be an option.

I am friends with a dozen or so full time guides who guide in the Tetons and AK and have casual friendships with maybe a dozen more. After having a close call last year I had a sit-down with myself and gave myself a good ass chewing as well as really dug into my own incident to get the answer to why it had happened. Part of my reflection involved going thru all of the accidents here (Tetons) or in AK that I had been directly involved with or had knowledge of with enough details to reach some sort of conclusion . As I went down the list I realized that every single one of the professionals (in the first group) that I know had had an incident were either they or a client had been involved in a slide of some magnitude. The sum total of days afield for that group easy numbers in the tens of thousands. They incidents total maybe 20. There is a bit of a numbers game involved here. If all you do is meadow skip you likely will never have an issue but spending time in high risk/reward areas tips the board considerably and all the data in the world that indicates that conditions are good to go can be skewed by something as insignificant and unnoticed as a bathtub ring of clouds that changes the snows surface creating an area of surface hoar that only exists for 300 ft of elevation on a 4500 ft Alaskan face, gets buried by the next storm and waits for someone to ski over it tipping the balance. A small area of shade on an otherwise sunny slope or a shallow area of rocks that are growing depth hoar can be completely unnoticed from the surface. I don't take comfort from this but in the end I realize that if your playing the high end game even the best players can get caught out. Even making what seem to be all the right plays. The goal is to make that margin of "bad luck" as tiny as possible...at least for me.

And to be clear I never used any of this to give myself a pass...I fucked up, I hope to never do it again.

Linking in the hope that at least one person reads and learns something that helps in their growth and maybe see's a red light blinking when it matters and pulls back.

https://www.tetongravity.com/forums/...Clipped-almost

This is an awesome post

[homemadesalsa]

Human nature is to push and push until failure, learn and do it again. We are hard wired in that manner and without it we would still be living in the jungle and eating bananas. As skiers from day one we try, fall get up, fall again and continue to learn and improve in that manner. The problem is the back country doesn't work that way and sometimes the fail means serious injury or death. When that happens getting up to do it again may or cannot be an option.

I am friends with a dozen or so full time guides who guide in the Tetons and AK and have casual friendships with maybe a dozen more. After having a close call last year I had a sit-down with myself and gave myself a good ass chewing as well as really dug into my own incident to get the answer to why it had happened. Part of my reflection involved going thru all of the accidents here (Tetons) or in AK that I had been directly involved with or had knowledge of with enough details to reach some sort of conclusion . As I went down the list I realized that every single one of the professionals (in the first group) that I know had had an incident were either they or a client had been involved in a slide of some magnitude. The sum total of days afield for that group easy numbers in the tens of thousands. They incidents total maybe 20. There is a bit of a numbers game involved here. If all you do is meadow skip you likely will never have an issue but spending time in high risk/reward areas tips the board considerably and all the data in the world that indicates that conditions are good to go can be skewed by something as insignificant and unnoticed as a bathtub ring of clouds that changes the snows surface creating an area of surface hoar that only exists for 300 ft of elevation on a 4500 ft Alaskan face, gets buried by the next storm and waits for someone to ski over it tipping the balance. A small area of shade on an otherwise sunny slope or a shallow area of rocks that are growing depth hoar can be completely unnoticed from the surface. I don't take comfort from this but in the end I realize that if your playing the high end game even the best players can get caught out. Even making what seem to be all the right plays. The goal is to make that margin of "bad luck" as tiny as possible...at least for me.

And to be clear I never used any of this to give myself a pass...I fucked up, I hope to never do it again.

Linking in the hope that at least one person reads and learns something that helps in their growth and maybe see's a red light blinking when it matters and pulls back.

https://www.tetongravity.com/forums/...Clipped-almost

Dude. Oh long time friend, I am one of those lifetime guides. You are correct, it's a numbers and exposure game. At my advanced age, I am no longer willing or able to guide at that level, so now can clearly see how much was skill and timing, and how much I truly got away with. At the time, you're in the flow, everything is connected and you can do the dance, avoid the lightning, and get home after dark once in a while. Looking at the newest generation of guides, I admire their brash confidence that invariably gets tempered, and try to give appropriate nudges now and again.

And good job, @wstdeep, debriefing your own scene.

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[old goat]

When I started touring in the Sierra Nevada it was something the great majority of people did in the spring. BC skiing in the winter, especially during and after storms, was basically XC skiing. I'm sure there were peope taking chances back then but I never saw them, never saw tracks in zones that are overrun today. The entire equation has shifted to the right on the risk/reward curve.
If you include BC snowmobilers avalanche deaths in the USA are similar to climbing deaths, FWIW.

[Ryan.Tyler]

When I started touring in the Sierra Nevada it was something the great majority of people did in the spring. BC skiing in the winter, especially during and after storms, was basically XC skiing. I'm sure there were peope taking chances back then but I never saw them, never saw tracks in zones that are overrun today. The entire equation has shifted to the right on the risk/reward curve.
If you include BC snowmobilers avalanche deaths in the USA are similar to climbing deaths, FWIW.

It looks like avalanche deaths have been relatively flat for the past 20 years, with an assumed significant increase in users, equaling a lower fatality rate per capita.

I believe your anecdotal example but what explains the “flat” results if the risk/reward curve has been shifted to the right by users?

Is it improved education/technology/techniques? If so, you could argue that reduces the risk (at least based on the statistics) to lower than the previous status quo.


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[old goat]

I think most people understand why more midwinter skiers on avalanche terrain--promotion, better gear, more competition for powder in the resorts, people see other people doing it. Whether the number of BC skier days on exposed terrain has increased over the last 30 years is unknown. Certainly more people have gear--we know it sold out last spring--but how many new users are on exposed terrain, are BC skiing regularly, stay with the sport is another question. Hopefully training and beacons are making things safer, but weren't we talking last year or the year before about a study that showed that the biggest risk factor for dying in an avalanche is having taken an Avy 1 course? If I remember correctly.