Respect The Conditions

There's not much achieved by trying to slice a particular risk level into sub-levels, it's sending entirely the wrong message. There were different national systems for categorizing risk levels and these were simplified to the five levels we've got today. The whole point of that was to give people in the mountains a simple way of assessing the dangers when leaving secured areas. There was, and still is, a body of thought that wanted to make this three levels like traffic lights. Inviting people to believe there's days with a "high 3", a "low 3" or a "medium 3" or an arbitrary number of sub-levels invites people to try and game the system.

For the record, 3 means

"Avalanches may be triggered on many slopes even if only light loads [2] are applied. On some slopes, medium or even fairly large spontaneous avalanches may occur."

in turn a light load is defined as :

light: a single skier or snowboarder smoothly linking turns and without falling, a group of skiers or snowboarders with a minimum 10 m gap between each person, a single person on snowshoes.

That's no more and no less than HAT described :

We're concerned because it can collapse with the weight of just one skier - that collapse can then release a slab avalanche under a person's feet or even on a steeper slope above them. Météo France is warning about this layer

Which is just how level three is defined, the weight of one person can cause a failure.

There is a poor layer in the pack but that's obvious, it wouldn't be risk three if the pack was consolidated. The significance of the layer arguably isn't anything to do with day to day risk, it's highly questionable how long it's going to take clear which is the concern. Most high risk levels are associated with recent snowfalls and clear as the top layer consolidated with an already consolidated base, that's not happening and that's a concern.

So, right now the snow's unstable and poorly consolidated but not incredibly dangerous in the scale of these things, it's just holiday time and you tend to see these incidents a lot. ie, these incidents are a lot more to do with human factors than they are some quality of the current snowpack

I am sure at some time there was a first live recovery of a skier using a transceiver too ;)

I posted it more with reference to the skier being avalanched 'close' to the piste where most recreational skiers would think they were 'safe'. In this instance I would bet the having RECCO reflectors gives them a better chance than having nothing at all (again, like most recreational skiers). I am sure most people on j2Ski have just nipped off piste for a taste of powder without really thinking through the consequences (myself included).

Level 3 is level 3 but there is a range across the level. If this wasn't the case it would not be necessary to read the avalanche bulletin before heading into the back country. Regardless of what it says on the hazard map in my opinion reading the bulletin is also necessary, not just looking at the hazard map and thinking it will be ok.

Pablo Escobar wrote:I am sure at some time there was a first live recovery of a skier using a transceiver too ;)

I posted it more with reference to the skier being avalanched 'close' to the piste where most recreational skiers would think they were 'safe'. In this instance I would bet the having RECCO reflectors gives them a better chance than having nothing at all (again, like most recreational skiers). I am sure most people on j2Ski have just nipped off piste for a taste of powder without really thinking through the consequences (myself included).

If you are skiing on the piste then the chances of every requiring RECCO is pretty slim (but burials on the piste do occasionally occur), however if you go off-piste and think that RECCO is sufficient safety equipment you are seriously misguided. I have met loads of people who thought they were safe because they had RECCO in their clothing. They were pretty shocked to be told that it would be great when people are searching for your body!!! If you go off-piste there is no substitute for a transceiver (plus shovel and probe) and know how to use it.

BTW... for the record from what I can gather I can not claim to have anything close to the experience that Ise and Bandit have off piste. I'm just someone who likes to go off piste and am highly aware of my lack of experience so I do everything I can to get as much knowledge I can.

You are missing my point totally. How many skiers go away and stick 100% to groomed runs, never venturing off the piste? At a guess, none. Therefore, the RECCO reflectors will without question be better than all the expensive equipment they don't have in a worst case scenario (slide on or very close to the piste).

Pablo Escobar wrote:You are missing my point totally. How many skiers go away and stick 100% to groomed runs, never venturing off the piste? At a guess, none. Therefore, the RECCO reflectors will without question be better than all the expensive equipment they don't have in a worst case scenario (slide on or very close to the piste).

No, I get your point. But don't necessarily agree. RECCO recoveries live are very rare. You are thought in any Avalanche course that to have any reasonably chance of survival you need to be located and dug out in less then 15 minutes (approx 90% survival chance). The ONLY way of reliably doing this is companion rescue with the use of a transciever.

RECCO gives people a false sense of security and very likely leads to people going into dangerous situations because they think they are suitably equipped because they have RECCO on their jacket. Therefore they are increasing their risk of an event happening, without having the necessary equipment or knowledge to increase survival chances if the sh!t does hit the fan.

Agreed, maybe its useful if someone is buried on or right next to the piste and people are quick enough to phone it in. But anywhere even just a little bit away from the piste its like playing Russian roulette.

ir12daveor wrote:

Pablo Escobar wrote:You are missing my point totally. How many skiers go away and stick 100% to groomed runs, never venturing off the piste? At a guess, none. Therefore, the RECCO reflectors will without question be better than all the expensive equipment they don't have in a worst case scenario (slide on or very close to the piste).

No, I get your point. But don't necessarily agree. RECCO recoveries live are very rare. You are thought in any Avalanche course that to have any reasonably chance of survival you need to be located and dug out in less then 15 minutes (approx 90% survival chance). The ONLY way of reliably doing this is companion rescue with the use of a transciever.

RECCO gives people a false sense of security and very likely leads to people going into dangerous situations because they think they are suitably equipped because they have RECCO on their jacket. Therefore they are increasing their risk of an event happening, without having the necessary equipment or knowledge to increase survival chances if the sh!t does hit the fan.

Agreed, maybe its useful if someone is buried on or right next to the piste and people are quick enough to phone it in. But anywhere even just a little bit away from the piste its like playing Russian roulette.

Who knows that if having a RECCO on a jacket will give someone the confidence to get in to dangerous situations, maybe certain types of people but you can't really say for sure. Invariably it will be better than having absolutely no equipment what so ever should something bad happen.

At US resorts in bounds, many people have been killed by avalanches, I'd bet it is only a matter of time before some people are saved. Should everyone on piste carry transceivers? Probably yes, but it isn't going to happen.




I had other pictures/videos in mind but I can't be bothered digging them up just now.

Pablo Escobar wrote:I am sure at some time there was a first live recovery of a skier using a transceiver too ;)

Quite so, just not 26 years after we started to use them )

Pablo Escobar wrote:I posted it more with reference to the skier being avalanched 'close' to the piste where most recreational skiers would think they were 'safe'. In this instance I would bet the having RECCO reflectors gives them a better chance than having nothing at all (again, like most recreational skiers). I am sure most people on j2Ski have just nipped off piste for a taste of powder without really thinking through the consequences (myself included).

Of course thousands of skiers have been doing just this for years without adverse outcomes by and large. But, it doesn't always work out, two teenage lads were buried here last year and one died, this was on a slope no more than 5 meters from the lift. It's a slope I've never skied, I know from a glance it's not a good place to be but they didn't have that skill and they didn't have any equipment, it needed several dog teams to find them.

One of the results of being here a few years now is that I can see an evolution in the slopes people are skiing and it's not a reassuring trend. People ski a few metres from the marked runs, then a few metres more and a bit more again and you start to see people in really dangerous places. On of the best illustrations I can give was some people here once who I know vaguely, Mrs Ise happened to see them and they just skied a closed run. She was pretty amazed given the conditions and asked if it was safe, the reply was it was closed as it hadn't been pisted. In fact, a large cornice hadn't been cleared as they couldn't fly a helicopter that day to bomb it. Fatter skis, the internet raising expectations about off-piste skiing, a false sense of security from transceivers or RECCO's even all contribute to that.

As for RECCO's near the piste, imagine the detector is in the lift station at the bottom, how long do you think it's going to take for someone to notice, then get it, then take it where it's needed? Do you really fancy those chances? The incident in Valmorel tells you it took them 20 minutes, it's a long time to be buried, any longer and your chances of survival are no better than a coin toss.

Pablo Escobar wrote:Who knows that if having a RECCO on a jacket will give someone the confidence to get in to dangerous situations, maybe certain types of people but you can't really say for sure.

No, we can say that for certain, it's a hugely well researched area of behavior. We're all guilty of it really.