Click here for the original article: Observe and assess - what's important?
In total, there were 25 pieces of assignable information and typical formulations as they appear in the SLF avalanche bulletins. For the sake of simplicity, we refer to the formulations to be assigned below as "questions" and the assignments as correct or incorrect answers, whereby depending on the question "correct" and "incorrect" do not necessarily apply categorically, but are related to the quiz. Behavioral recommendations for certain levels, such as "renunciation recommended" for level 5 or "be aware of the risk of falling" for level 1, can also be applied to other levels without this being "wrong" in principle. The purpose of the quiz is to check whether the linguistic expressions used by the SLF to characterize the hazard levels are understood in this way, or what the common understanding of the meaning of the levels is. Individual formulations are particularly common in Switzerland, but the majority are also used in other German-speaking Alpine countries.
There were five suitable answers for each of the five levels of the European hazard level scale. The questions were also divided into five "question categories": key point-like descriptions of the situation, characteristic alarm signs, probability of triggering and avalanche sizes, behavioral recommendations and key statistical data on the frequency of the individual levels in relation to the number of victims at this level. For each of these five categories there were again five suitable answers, one for each danger level. The image above right shows the questions, arranged according to the aforementioned scheme (5 levels, 5 question categories, click to enlarge).
In total, there were 6957 answers from around 280 people (not all quiz participants completed all questions), of which 4427 were correct (64%).
There was only one question with over 90% correct answers:
Disaster situation (level 5) - Number of answers: 267, of which 95% were correct
The following questions had less than 40% correct answers:
Ski down extremely steep slopes individually and be aware of the risk of falling.
Number of answers: 276, correct: 36%. Most frequent answer: Level 2. Correct answer: Level 1
Limit yourself to moderately steep terrain. Pay attention to run-out areas. Inexperienced skiers should stay on the open routes and descents.
Number of answers: 285, correct: 34%. Most frequent answer: Level 3. Correct answer: Level 4
Predicted for around 20% of the winter. Around 5% of all fatalities
Number of answers: 280, correct: 33%. Most common answer: Level 2. Correct answer: Level 1
Withdrawal recommended.
Number of answers: 267, correct: 28%. Most frequent answer: Level 4. correct answer: Level 5
