Gleitschneelawine

Sliding snow avalanches cannot be triggered by a regular additional load - neither as a skier nor as a blaster. Why is that the case?

Summer firn is a little-known type of snow among skiers - but summer mountaineers often encounter it. We discuss the most important characteristics of snow that is usually reserved for hardy ski tourers and pick up where the last SnowFlurry left off.

The International Snow Science Workshop (ISSW) takes place every two years, alternating between the USA, Canada and Europe. The last ISSW was held in Breckenridge, Colorado, in October 2016. The ISSW is the largest scientific conference on snow and avalanches and offers snow researchers from various disciplines the opportunity to get together. Over the next few weeks, we will be taking a closer look at the findings presented there. We start with some news on the topics of model chains, fracture mechanics and avalanche detection.

There have already been five avalanche fatalities in (South) Tyrol this season. Unfortunately, because where there is snow and mountains, there are also avalanches - no matter what time of year.

The WeatherBlog is currently located in an area of the world, somewhere between so-called Styria and so-called Carinthia, where there is only sometimes and even then only shaky, minute-by-minute free Internet. As the weather forecast by looking out of the window only works to a limited extent, we leave the current events, if they are relevant in terms of powder, to our colleague the Oracle.

Last week's suspected change in the general weather situation is a thing of the past, the western slide is doing well and Fabienne is on the way. After a few fantastic winter days with freezing cold postcard weather, the next batch of powder is just in time for the weekend.

In 2011, we want to take a leaf out of the book of the ubiquitous annual reviews. As a skier, you usually think more in terms of winters and less in terms of calendar years, but if you sprinkle a few key statistical data points into the weather talk with strangers on the lift, you come across as incredibly well-educated, which rarely hurts.