Backcountry Avalanche Awareness
Prepare yourself for the backcountry environment
It’s in the decision; to ski a slope or not…
Here is the chance to do all those things you mean to check every time you go out but fail to remember to do because you get carried away with just sliding about in the snow!
Generally, you would spend 2-3 days travelling around a ski area that has a variety of good off-piste terrain. Here we would look at what has recently been happening with regards to the weather, recent snowfall, changing snow conditions and any recent avalanche activity. It is always an on-going learning process. However what you learn during these days will start tuning your thoughts towards the observations and the decisions you want to be confident in making each time you explore the backcountry.
In particular, we’ll be looking at:
- relating the snow cover to the different aspects of the hill-side and recent weather conditions
- digging snow-pits to help understand about the layers of the snow and slope stability
- assessing and making decisions about the snowpack while on the move
- understanding your avalanche rescue equipment; transceiver, shovel and probe
- doing transceiver searches; single and multiple burials
Snowpit analysis to look at the layering in the snowpack
The wheres and whys of recent avalanche activity