Lawinensicherheit

Moisture penetration and nocturnal radiation now become the primary avalanche-forming factor. What about temperature reserve, original layer sequence, humidity and isothermality?

The tiresome issue of human error with the old snow problem remains - just like human error with the danger levels.

As an elementary piece of safety equipment, the probe is (hopefully!) stowed in every freerider's or ski tourer's backpack and always ready to go. Actually, there is not much to such a probe and practically all models available on the market are likely to work reliably. For me, a "good" Sonder is therefore characterized more by a combination of the right little things.

The successful avalanche backpacks with the "Removable Airbag System" (RAS) from Mammut have been widely used for several years. With the "Short" versions, Mammut has developed backpacks that are designed for the female anatomy or athletes with a short upper body. "Short" versions of the Ride or Pro RAS backpack are available. I tested the Pro RAS version.

She actually knew where the dangers lurked that day. Why didn't it stop her from climbing? A story about failure and the courage to talk about mistakes.

The basic safety equipment - avalanche transceiver, shovel and probe - is preached like a mantra in every avalanche course. Of the three, the avalanche transceiver is given a lot of attention, while the shovel and probe are overshadowed. It's long past time that PowderGuide took a closer look at these products.

There is now a wealth of popular scientific works on the internet that are relatively easy to understand. Finding these is usually the greater challenge. A collection that can be expanded at will:

BCA and Alpride now have similarly lightweight and small airbag systems as the other manufacturers. Some companies that previously bought in airbag systems for their own backpacks are taking them out of the range completely after winters with low sales. Mammut has completely redesigned Barryvox avalanche transceivers - one in the mid-price segment and one high-end device.

For a change, we immerse ourselves in theoretical thought processes relating to people, the psyche and snow. A fundamental assumption: the distinction between experience and knowledge.

The assessment of the avalanche situation on a large scale is carried out for us by the situation report. We have to use this basis to assess the local hazard potential ourselves. This can be very easy today, very difficult tomorrow and hardly possible the day after tomorrow.

For the fifth time, the "Snow and Safety Conference" took place in Zürs am Arlberg right at the start of the Ski Arlberg season. The generally difficult conditions in the northern Alps were known in advance, but this did not discourage the organizers from successfully carrying out their supporting program.

Two skiing software developers were dissatisfied with the range of free slope maps available online and created their own map without further ado. The OpenSlopeMap covers Austria, South Tyrol, Bavaria and Slovenia, can be used online and offline and is free of charge. Developer Peter Schnappauf on the OpenSlopeMap project: