Avalance Safety Update – Return of Old Snow Problem
Welcome to the safety update from we powder in collaboration with the snow Safety Center it’s January 12 2024 what do we have for you this week um we have seen quite some accidents as well in the elps as in the um in Northern America as I prepare my
Presentation for you uh um so we will have a look at that uh fortunately most of them were were without much harm but we saw two casualties nonetheless we will have a look of course at the evalent situation throughout the Alps many accidents this week especially in
France and I show you a couple of examples this is might be very familiar to to some of you this is the banana kulir in lra this is a kulir that gets skied very very regular and uh usually there’s even Moguls after a period without storms but
This time there was a wind slap in the kulir and somebody triggered it and luckily there was no Harm um further south in France in the UB region near barcelon uh there was was an incident where one person was doing a tour on its own um we know very little about the circumstances and there was even a request for information and unfortunately the person died of the
Consequences of the um Avalanche and it took a long time before they recovered him then another Avalanche in an area that many of you might be familiar with this this is in valter in the three valleys in France a season worker working out of lemoner was skiing off past alone and it
Was a day with bad visibility the weather was not that good and the person got caught in a Avalanche and he was coincidentally spotted by ski patrol that was doing that was patrolling a past and there was a little clearance clearance in the weather and they saw this person
Sticking out of the snow seriously injured um they got to him the helicopter couldn’t fly because of the bad weather they took him down by sled and then uh with the um cable car and he ended up in a hospital seriously injured and for the ones of you who are familiar
With the region of volter where the ski area of alter this is the uh ski lift of the of the ground F and this is the chair lift of the portet followed by the very short uh Cable Car of the Torrance and the slope where the evalan
Occurred is just on the side of it just on the side of the arrival of the telek cabin torans and on this side you go down to the oral side of U of volter so this might be very familiar train for many of you and there were many more incidents
In the in laar the K vales in the Morana and and many many more but no one was hurt in these incidents or only very minor uh injuries fortunately in southern T Italy we saw an incident in the ski area rings with two youngsters and it was a very small
Avan actually size one and size one means usually it’s not enough to kill you unless it’s in combination with some kind of terrain trap uh both the youngsters were partially buried but one of them was with the head under the snow and therefore there was a critical situation we don’t know exactly
How it ended up I think no one was injured they didn’t say it in the in the report this is the snow profile they took the day after the incident at the Stellar arm um and it looked like this and you can see that these last two tests were clear
Results of breakage and propagation of the initial fracture and the fractures occurred right on these very weak these soft layers above and beneath this old rain crust melt freeze rain crust and you see that the um crystals that we see our facet on one side and our depth hor on the other side
Which is basically the same but another stage of the same thing um so still old crusts that might cause problems this is the wind slab of this incident you can see the snow is very well bunded typical wind slap and the crown also shows you the typical crown
For a wind slab um where the thickness of the crown is very variable so here in the middle is the thickest part was about 1 met 40 and to the sides it’s maybe something like 70 CM or so so this is very typical for wind slabs in Northern America we have seen two
Inbound Avalanches this week which is pretty rare but they do happen one was at the Palisades a very famous face in ski area of tahoo and we saw one in Whistler black um at the pal palisad unfortunately one person was killed and one was injured and this is a photo
Taken just after the incident where people are still searching for other people and as you can see the weather wasn’t that good so a tragic accident in the Palisades on the first day of opening of this space in Whistler blackham they had more luck there were no
Injuries and oh that was not so good uh there were no injuries and you can see the snowboarder triggering the Avalanche but fortunately he was able to escape from it it’s not a very large Avalanche but still some harm could have been done and as you can see other writers are
Very impressed with this incident so inbound usually safe but pay attention at a situation which a considerable or higher evalan level now let’s look at the elps excuse me this is the situation on Friday January 12th and as you can see it’s a pretty normal situation with lots
Of level two in Switzerland France and also in Austria so let’s start by an eastern part of Austria and the sou burgerland we see in the in the mountains there’s usually a level two situation on the basis of wind slabs lower down in the mountain uh still some Glide Avalanches
Can occur but the main problem when wind slabs if we move over to the west to Tyrone the same thing again above Tree Line wind slabs are the main problem some of the wind slabs are fresh and some of them are older but it’s possible to trigger both of them another step to
The West will arrive in Switzerland and in Switzerland we see an old friend coming by and this is the old snow problem the persistent weak layers a level two situation persistent weak layers we haven’t seen this very much this winter but now we’re seeing it all across Switzerland all the areas have
The same problem a level two situation on the basis of old snow problem only in the region furthest East around clusters they have a wind slab problem being doin dominant uh again one one step to the West will’ll arrive at the MBL region shamoni and here we have a level two
Situation also with an old snow problem lower down of the mountain Glide snow problems uh Glide snow Avalanches are possible main problem being old snow and they give no boundary on the elevation of the problem which is quite typical or quite rare actually they say that the
Slabs are very hard to identify and they seem to go randomly as they call it so slabs hard to identify but they might be pretty big in the FASA which is the area with among others the three valleys so Kel Val lemon Mel uh ski areas
Um also no boundary in the elevation for the problem the main problem being winds slab lower down Glide Avalanches basically you are dealing with on all elevations you’re dealing with smaller Avalanches not causing too much of a problem if it’s not in combination of a Terrain trap but they
Say above 2,000 M there are still deeper laying buried weak layers and therefore the crown of these originally wind slabs will get thicker and therefore you get bigger Avalanches so this sounds very much like an old snow problem but as you can see they didn’t indicate it here in the tares a bit
Further uh in France this is where you find the ski areas of Steen Val Sak situation is almost identical when we go to the southern elps in France situation is more tense with a considerable rating and in the k um they say that above 2200 meters there’s a combination of wind slabs wind
Slab being dominant but also an old snow problem persistent weak layers and because of the those deeper laying weak layers the slabs can get thicker and therefore bigger they are hard to initiate initi initiate um but they propagate very well so there’s a little chance of triggering
Those slabs but when you trigger them they’re going to be pretty big with a high volume in Italy the AA Val Valley it’s a level two situation also with no indication for the elevations the wind slabs are above 2300 M and the fresh snow problem is for all
Elevations so it snowed down to the valley uh the danger level is at two and it will remain steady for this weekend they say bit further to the east at the valy Alp a wind slab problem in combination with an old snow problem also old snow
For the nor Northern aspects but on all elevations the wind slaps above 2200 meters and they warn especially for something that is very important always uh be careful at the first day with nice weather after a period of storms they especially say after this period of bad weather we had this will
Be the first nice day also Friday 12 and um be careful and this first nice day after period of storms we always see lots of accidents I thank you for your attention and for watching us and uh we’ll see you next time and for everybody in the
Mountains and going to the snow be safe
Last week there were a striking number of incidents involving winter sports enthusiasts and avalanches. Fortunately, most of them ended well and we will have a look at them. Two of them were on familiar territory for many freeriders! We also briefly view the snow profile of an incident in Southern Tyrol. Naturally, we will take a tour through the Alps: which avalanche problems occur where? In Auatria wind slabs (snow moved by the wind), is the biggest problem at a danger level 2 (moderate). In Switzerland, an old acquaintance from last year appears: the Old Snow problem (hidden persistant weak layers)! This is a difficult problem to judge. The danger level in Switzerland does nowhere exceed level 2 (moderate). The same applies to the Northern Alps of France. The Old Snow problem plays a dominant role around Chamonix, but towards the large ski areas in the Vanoise (including the 3 Vallées) and Haute Tarentaise (Tignes/Val d’Isêre, les Arcs, Ste.Foy) the pictograms do not indicate an Old Snow problem, but it is referred to in the text. The danger level in the Northern Alps does not exceed level 2 (moderate). This is different in the Southern Alps of France, where many regions still face a level 3 (considerable) situation with a combination of Wind Slabs and the Old Snow problem. The latter ensures that the avalanches can become surprisingly large. In Italy, Wind Slabs play the leading role, but to the east we also see our Old Snow friend reappearing.
BE SAFE!
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