What's missing from online avy safety videos

[whipski]

One of the more renowned avy forecasters from the Silverton area survived 3 burials. I'd also add:

your partners

[I've seen black diamonds!]

What's the probability of an accident?
What are the possible consequences of an accident?
Who are the people involved?
How good is our plan?

I have kids. If I'm uncomfortable with any of these I back off. And uncertainty = uncomfortable. Being optimistic about uncertainty has put me in dangerous places a few times.

[goldenboy]

Lots of good comments by FG and others. I'm not sure exactly what the OP is looking for, but my local center had a good video this morning (I thought). Sort of a day in the life of a forecaster tour, and Evan is funny, so that helps. It's on the beginner side of things, perhaps, but here it is.

[adrenalated]

Foggy is pretty much killing it in this thread but I'll add a few thoughts.

I think what the OP is describing is a video series that at least somewhat fills the role that a mentor traditionally would have had. When I started, it was pretty commonly accepted practice to go find an experienced person(s) and start your backcountry career by traveling with them and learning about their decision making process (as well as formal classes). Fast forward 15+ years and now there are SO MANY people getting into backcountry riding that people are (understandably) skipping this step. Not to mention, "experienced" means different things to different people, and one can have a great deal of experience making extremely bad decisions.

I do think there is a bit of a gap in formal avalanche education in really talking through risk and the decision making process. I don't know how to address that. I know the recent updates to Level 1 and Rec Level 2 curricula were an attempt to address that to some extent. I agree fully that it is not the forecast center's place to do this.

I've been strongly encouraging experienced people this year to consider taking some time to pass on what they know to someone new and act as a mentor if possible.

[BFD]

in the old days we just went out and skied a lot. Now everyone wants to just look at their phone.

[frorider]

Lots of good comments by FG and others. I'm not sure exactly what the OP is looking for, but my local center had a good video this morning (I thought). Sort of a day in the life of a forecaster tour, and Evan is funny, so that helps. It's on the beginner side of things, perhaps, but here it is.

This is a good example I think of an attempt to tie together info into actual ski day decisions. If this format were used on a variety of tours, it would help educate in the way I think the OP was requesting.

I was lucky to get this type of education over the years with some experienced partners, nearly all of who seemed very aware of the heuristic trap of thinking of themselves as ‘experience experts’.

[toast2266]

I feel like what OP is looking for is some expert / experienced guidance in interpreting middle of the road conditions.

The rating for the day is moderate. You dig a pit and get an ECT 21 Q2. There's a deeper problem layer, but it's 150cm down and hasn't been reactive. Wind direction has been consistent, and wind loaded slopes are reasonably avoidable. There haven't been any reports of slides on similar aspects in 2 days, and the last time it snowed was 3 days ago.

How aggressive will you get with your terrain choice? The answer is different in different locations, and everyone's going to be different per their risk tolerance, but it would be interesting to at least hear a discussion of the thought process on a day like that from someone with a lot of experience. If they're standing on top of a 38 degree face, would they ski it? What other information beyond their knowledge of the snow pack and the angle and aspect of the slope are they considering?

[MakersTeleMark]

Sorry if I was not clear.

I did not mean to imply that a decision to ski or not ski a slope should be based solely on examination of a snow pit. I understand that many other factors go into that decision. (slope angle, terrain, avalanche poodle tests, etc.)

What I am looking for is a go / no-go decision with an explanation of the rationale behind the decision, (which could/should include many factors other than what is seen in the snow pit.)

The problem is that there is a ton of information out there on the more esoteric aspects of snow science. There is almost none with real life examples regarding how to make the binary decision of "do I ski that?"


Here's an extreme example:

A guy doing an extended column test. It fails and propagates after 7 taps.

With a test result such as this, I'm pretty sure most everyone would agree that, absent some over-riding mitigating circumstances (very low slope angle, perhaps) nobody should ski this.

And yet, nowhere does the guy say, "DON'T SKI THIS."

This is an extreme example. Maybe they figure that anyone with half a brain could know not to ski something that reacts this way. But there are many other less extreme examples where it's not so obvious.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dHE0...ature=emb_logo

That is not true, some will come out and say straight up their no-go:

https://www.blackdiamondequipment.co...d-column-test/

How do I make sense of my result?

The short answer is really simple. If you get an ECTP, (the “P” stands for propagation, meaning the weak layer fails across the entire column) then stay out of any avalanche terrain on that slope. That's correct, it's a NO GO situation. Pretend that you just observed a massive collapse underfoot.

Really, it's that cut and dry?

Yes, it is.

And take this for thought:

https://theavalanchereview.org/ect-test-update/



Unlike snow science, it's cut and dried btw. That really bugs me, but wrong thread.

[MakersTeleMark]

I could envision a “dramatic reading” of Tremper’s book in the style of Planet Earth

macro shots of crystals debonding with the micro sounds to match

360 time lapse of loading in progress from crystals zoomed out to the view from 10k’

Trigger closeup zooming out to the resulting release & slide ending in a zoom back in to the compaction at the bottom

The book is good but I expect it could be improved on with pertinent visual story telling, maybe even with his ok following his chapter structure

[ultimately won’t completely satisfy a “complete” education, but could be improved]

just my imagination

Here is some drama:

[Buke]

I feel like what OP is looking for is some expert / experienced guidance in interpreting middle of the road conditions.

Lots of good comments in here. I think this statement sums up what I suspect the OP is looking for. I can relate. I took an avy class about 20 years ago. I learned a lot. One of the things I learned was that it was really complicated and I didn't have a clue what I was doing. I certainly got some good science info about how snow transforms with temperature gradients and how wind was a big deal and the concept of understanding terrain was driven home. But what I took away more than anything was that I was clueless and really wasn't in a position to make good decisions.

Last winter I retook the Avy 1 class. With 20 years of meadow skipping under my belt and a fair amount of reading and observation I was in a much better position to get something out of the class but the way the class was structured had also changed dramatically. The guys teaching the class boiled it down to a few simple things. Primarily, if there's a strong layer over a weak layer then you have a potential avalanche problem. Really, it doesn't matter too much what caused the condition to set up, if there's a weak layer buried under a stronger layer then there's the potential for a problem.

For me, that little revelation was eye opening. I knew that to be true but to have it explained so simply was really important.

I went out on a short tour a week or so ago. There had been quite a bit of new snow with some rain mixed in and some warming a couple days earlier. We made observation on the approach as we skinned uphill. There were no signs of instability. When we got to the top of the climb, which was right at the foot of some pretty big avalanche terrain, we dug a hasty pit and did a half assed ECT test for fun. It took a lot of effort to get anything to fail on those recent layers and nothing propogated. That confirmed what we already knew. If the results had been reactive I would have pushed for a more conservative terrain on the descent but with the confirmation that the newer wet snow was fairly well bonded to a couple rain crusts in the snow pack and there didn't seem to be any sign that things would propogate, I felt comfortable to ski the better, steeper, more open terrain.

The key was that we knew that there was a heavy consolidated layer of snow on top (strong layer) and it was over some layers that were potentially weaker. We assessed that potential problem and decided that it wasn't a concern.

Of course, living in the PNW where our snowpack is usually really stable and the key to dealing with weak layers is usually just to wait a couple days, makes the whole process a lot easier.