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Blog: Travel Advice for the Avalanche Problems - feedback requested

Drew Hardesty
Forecaster

This fall, Wendy Wagner from the ChugachAvalanche Center in Alaska and I started working on travel recommendations/advice for each of the Avalanche Problems associated with the avalanche forecast. We've been querying others across the field as well as consumers of the avalanche products. I consider the Wasatch to havethe savviest and well-educated backcountry folks around - so - we'd love to have your take/feedback on the project. (feedback box below or direct - [email protected])

Our project set about to create a set of travel recommendations for the Avalanche Problems that have become the standard for avalanche forecast centers. In turn, the Avalanche Problems have become the backbone for avalanche education throughout North America. Among professionals, it is widely agreed that the avalanche conditions - that is, the overall danger as well as the particular type of avalanche one expects, determine one's choice of terrain. This is the essence of safe travel in the mountains - the Holy Grail ofmatching one's terrain to the snowpack. Many of our Tier 1 and Tier 2 users are only beginning to understand this concept; thus, we sought to create a fairly universal tool that forecast centers could use alongside the avalanche problems to assist the public in making appropriate terrain choices. Note how travel recommendations are a part of the Avalanche Danger Scale - (and if they are useful for danger ratings, they might be more useful for each avalanche problem).

We wanted the travel recommendations to be simple, useful, and easily compared based upon a parallel structure of a narrowed-down set of metrics (see below).

We divided them into two groups based upon what we'd call their inherent "manageability", or lack thereof. Manageability is well aligned with the overall degree of certainty (and again, lack thereof) of what I'd call "predictive snow behaviour". It is also aligned with user's skill/experience and overall size of the avalanche. To this end, we categorized them under Normal Caution and Extra Caution.

Normal Caution avalanche problems include

  • Loose Dry
  • Loose Wet
  • Storm Snow
  • Cornice
  • Low Danger

Extra Caution avalanche problems include

  • Persistent Slab
  • Deep Slab
  • Wet Slab
  • Glide Slab
  • Wind Slab

Metrics for each include

  • Manageability/Certainty?
  • Slope angles and terrain patterns associated with each
  • Potential for remotely triggered slides and considerations for walking beneath avalanche paths
  • How well are Obvious Clues to Instability noted
  • InherentDangerous/destructive potential

Travel Recommendations DRAFT December 2013

Drew Hardesty, UAC Wendy Wagner, CNFAIC

Two categories – Extra Caution and Normal Caution (sample icons)

Extra Caution Normal Caution

Deep Slab Storm Slab

Persistent Slab Dry Loose Snow

Wet Slab Wet Loose Snow

Wind Slab Cornice

Glide Low Danger

********** Extra Caution

**************************************************************************************************

Deep Slab Avalanches

Unmanageable avalanche conditions associated with a high level of uncertainty. Extra Caution is advised. Test slopes, slope cuts, previous tracks, and cornice drops tend to provide little information on stability. Typically confined to particular aspects and elevations (as depicted in the current avalanche forecast). Avoid this terrain or choose slopes gentler than 30 degrees in steepness with nothing steeper above or adjacent to you. Remote triggering possible, even from the valley below. Give runout zones a wide berth. Due to potential size, traumatic injury, death, or deep burial is likely.

Glide Avalanches

Unmanageable avalanche conditions associated with a high level of uncertainty. Extra Caution is advised. Test slopes, ski cuts, previous tracks, and cornice drops often provide little information on stability. Typically confined to particular aspects and elevations (as depicted in the current forecast). Avoid this terrain or choose slopes gentler than 30 degrees in steepness with nothing steeper above. Give runout zones a wide berth. Due to potential size, traumatic injury, death, or deep burial is likely.

Persistent Slab Avalanches

Unmanageable avalanche conditions associated with a high level of uncertainty. Extra Caution is advised. Test slopes, ski cuts, previous tracks, and cornice drops often provide little information on stability. Typically confined to particular aspects and elevations (as depicted in the current avalanche forecast). Avoid this terrain or choose slopes gentler than 30 degrees in steepness with nothing steeper above. Remote triggering possible, even from the valley below. Give runout zones a wide berth.

Wet Slab Avalanches

Unmanageable avalanche conditions associated with a high level of uncertainty. Extra Caution is advised. Test slopes, ski cuts, previous tracks, and cornice drops often provide little information on stability. More prevalent on the sunlight aspects (or as depicted in the current avalanche forecast). Avoid this terrain or choose slopes gentler than 35 degrees in steepness with nothing steeper above. Remote triggering possible, even from the valley below. Give runout zones a wide berth. Due to potential size, traumatic injury, death, or deep burial is likely.

Wind Slab Avalanches

Can be manageable or unmanageable avalanche conditions associated with higher levels of certainty for experienced snow travelers. Extra Caution is advised. Test slopes, ski cuts, previous tracks, and cornice drops may provide some level of information on stability. Typically confined to particular aspects and elevations (or as depicted in the current avalanche forecast). Avoid this terrain or choose slopes gentler than 35 degrees in steepness. Give runout zones a wide berth when natural avalanches are expected or when others may be traveling above you.

********************Normal Caution

Loose Dry Avalanches

Usually manageable avalanche conditions associated with higher levels of certainty for experienced snow travelers. Normal Caution is advised. Test slopes, ski cuts, previous tracks, and cornice drops may provide some level of information on stability. More prevalent at the higher elevations on all aspects (as depicted in the current avalanche forecast). Avoid this terrain or choose slopes gentler than 40 degrees in steepness. Give runout zones a wide berth when natural avalanches are expected or when others may be traveling above you.

Loose Wet Avalanches

Usually manageable avalanche conditions associated with higher levels of certainty for experienced snow travelers. Normal Caution is advised. Test slopes, ski cuts, previous tracks, and cornice drops may provide some level of information on stability. More prevalent on the sunlight aspects (or as depicted in the current avalanche forecast). Avoid this terrain or choose slopes gentler than 40 degrees in steepness. Give runout zones a wide berth when natural avalanches are expected or when others may be traveling above you.

Storm Snow Avalanches

Usually manageable avalanche conditions associated with higher levels of certainty for experienced snow travelers. Normal Caution is advised. Test slopes, ski cuts, previous tracks, and cornice drops may provide some level of information on stability. More prevalent at the higher elevations on all aspects (as depicted in the current avalanche forecast). Avoid this terrain or choose slopes gentler than 35 degrees in steepness. Give runout zones a wide berth when natural avalanches are expected or when others may be traveling above you.

Cornice

Usually manageable avalanche conditions for experienced snow travelers. Normal Caution is advised. Prevalent along the ridgelines at the mid and higher elevations on particular aspects (as depicted in the current avalanche forecast). Cornices may release on approach. Avoid traveling along corniced ridgelines, as cornices may break back further than expected. Avoid traveling through terrain with significant cornices above. Give a wide berth when natural cornice fall is likely, when cornice fall may trigger avalanches below, or when others may be traveling above you.

Low Danger

Usually manageable avalanche conditions for backcountry recreationalists. Extra caution is warranted when traveling in exposed, steep terrain with high consequences where typically small and benign avalanches pose a significant hazard.

At this point, the idea would be to have a mouse over/pop-up window or link via a subscript 'i' to produce a window (persistent slabphoto Zach Grant)-

SAMPLE LOOK OF A POPUP WINDOW -

Other ideas would be to have different icons for each metric (manageability/certainty, reliability of tests, "habitat", etc) with a scale for each. Again, the goal is simple, useful, and intuitive.

Comments
Nice work, good ideas. One of the things I look to is the consequence of a bad decision. That is, what are the terrain conditions below. I've skied many wet loose snow slides without worry when its smooth and open below, but that would be unwise if there was a 100' cliff band below. Or similarly, a fresh loose snow slide could be not too concerning if clear below but avoided completely if there is a stand of thick trees with increasing slope below.
John Knoblock
Thu, 1/2/2014
Hi Drew and Wendy. Cool idea! I have new 6 month old son whom I love so much and also dream of skiing steeper runs, so this topic held a special fascination for me. The topic is fairly abstract and the terminology we use to talk about it is not common to all of us, so it can be a confusing discussion, but I will give it a shot. First, if we set a common idealistic goal, then when we talk about travel recommendations we can all have the same goal in mind. As an example, I will put the following theoretical idealistic goal statement out there: “I want to be 99.9% certain that my travel recommendation mitigates 99.9 percent of the avalanche risk.” These “Travel Recommendations” could be a set of ever-changing guidelines for yourself as you make decisions throughout a ski day. This goal statement might seem obvious to some, but I’m sure we’ve all skied with someone who seemed to have other goals in mind or a different threshold of risk tolerance. Individuals would be welcome to adjust these certainty or risk thresholds based on their own personal outlook. I only set them at the highest lever for the sake of discussion. This is where I believe a guide should have their risk threshold set or where anyone who takes a responsibility for someone else’s safety would set their threshold. (DOT and snow safety personnel) So anyway, for the sake of argument, we want to make travel recommendations to ourselves and others that we are 99.9 certain will mitigate 99.9 % of the avalanche risk. I think this gives a basis to start talking about, what we know, what don’t know, and how that affects the risk and travel route recommendations or decision making. So based on the above, I wonder if it would make sense to change the terminology you presented as “Elevated Caution” and “Normal Caution” to something like “Unknown Risk” and “Known Risk” or “Low Certainty” and ‘High Certainty”. This allows us to better model how what we know and don’t know might affect our overall certainty and risk of a travel recommendation. The other thing that this change in terminology might accomplish is get away from using terms that indicate that you may be able let your guard down. I believe that your caution level should remain constant. Your route may vary or your slope assessment may change with time and place, but your caution level should never drop. This part is a little abstract, but really when you are talking about making terrain choices or travel recommendations to yourself during a ski tour, you are talking a lot about the “human factor”. And it seems many accidents happen when something causes your guard to go down. So talking about “Normal Caution” and “Elevated Caution” may not be as useful in the advisory for the general public as just evaluating the risk like a machine and talking about the level of certainty associated with each of the existing avalanche problems. I know that for me personally, as bad as it sounds, when it is sunny out, I make decisions differently than when it is storming. So I have to be diligent in my decisions and not let my caution wane. Another point is that a wet afternoon slide can kill you just as dead as persistent slab….both require caution and, depending on the situation you find yourself in, the wet slide may require even more caution than the persistent slab. It’s just that the behavior of the wet slide is more predictable or it has a high level of certainty than the persistent slab type avalanche problem. And we all know what happens if you let your caution drop below elevated when near a cornice. So caution remains at a constant level but the birth that you give the different types of avalanche problems varies in order to keep the certainty of the risk mitigation high. This birth is both in decision space and in actual travel route selection. I have some ideas about evaluating the certainty levels for each avalanche problem and factoring them into travel recommendation but I guess I will have to leave those for the next time. Thanks for all your work - Aaron
Aaron Stanford
Fri, 1/3/2014
<p>Aaron - you bring about some great points. &nbsp;I&#39;d also put a nod toward Gerald Wilde, who introduced the term Risk Homeostasis, suggesting that people work to maximize their benefit by comparing the expected costs and benefits of safer and riskier behavior to find their optimal&nbsp;<em>target level of risk</em>. He suggests that when safety measures are introduced, the added sense of protection prompts drivers to engage in riskier behavior to optimize the cost/benefits while the overall risk remains basically the same in spite of the safety measures. &nbsp;</p> <p>This applies to the vulnerability of the backcountry skier/rider (regarding safety equipment, etc), but it also relates to how one keeps their risk level static by adjusting their terrain choices to a dynamic snowpack. &nbsp;</p> <p>A couple other points -&nbsp;</p> <ul> <li>I am not entirely wedded to Normal Caution and Extra Caution...I used Normal Caution as low hanging fruit as an icon we already had...but as it is&nbsp;used for Low Danger....I find that there can be no confusion with this and we&#39;d either create a new Low Danger icon or new &quot;categories&quot;. &nbsp;It may be useful to frame the icons on the advisory the denote the Extra Caution or ...?</li> <li>What I do want to convey to the public (and Don Sharaf has written of it as well in the upcoming TAR/The Avalanche Review - periodical of Avalanche Association), is that not all avalanches are created equal, and that some are &quot;inherently more dangerous&quot; than others, all things being equal. &nbsp;Exceptions are not uncommon and should be well described in the text box near the avalanche problem icon in the day&#39;s advisory.</li> </ul> <p>Thanks to you and all the other thoughtful, constructive feedback coming in. &nbsp;-&nbsp;</p> <p>Drew</p>
Drew
Sat, 1/4/2014
I like the idea of the popup window. Maybe it could be a blinking window where readers could click on it to see the added information. It could be labeled added caution. Great ideas as always. Thanks.
Willis Richardson
Fri, 1/3/2014
I would second the points brought up by Aaron. I'd say normal/extra caution does not describe the decision process well and might be counter productive in the same way as the 5 level scale is often effectively reduced to 3 in minds of many riders (1,2-no problems, 3 - great pow, but something might happen, 4,5 - don't ride). Normal caution just might suggest similar ideas - "it's only normal caution, I'll be fine". What you're really talking about is (un)known, (un)certain, (un)manageable risk where extra caution does not really apply. You either try to avoid the situation altogether or you accept the risk.
Jernej Burkeljca
Mon, 1/6/2014