[Bedivere]

This entire thread appears to be largely unnecessary, but please, keep feeding the troll...

[Schenk]

There was a skier triggered slide in bounds at Schweitzer this weekend. Lesson: in the right conditions an avalanche can occur anywhere, even in bounds. Beware the iso-thermal snow pack.

[FUN CH]

[FUN CH]

I'm trying to develop a pro vs con list, so any ideas would be appreciated. In my area, NE Cascades we have yet another crust layer and an invesion cloud with recent clear nights. Probable double wammy surface frost formation. If there existed a hazard map that contained recorded data collected from 35 years of near-miss incident reports and observed avalanche reports, imagine how useful this map would be right now.

[dave allyn]

Such a hazard map would be crowded and useless. Knowing a certain locale had an avalanche sometime in the last 35 years hardly helps me decide where to travel today.

[FUN CH]

[Bedivere]

I'm trying to wrap my head around why data from 35 years ago, much less last year is at all useful in assessing risks this year.

[FUN CH]

[trestle]

The word that comes to mind, again, is tedious. Yes the information is valuable but who is going to publish and maintain it? You've swung from insisting that anyone with a permit for guiding on public lands provide the information to now sharing personal anecdotes as if they're going to ever be collated in a usable manner. Again, all that you seek is already available if one is willing to research and ask. The freedom of the hills does not include a bright orange WARNING sticker. btw, the Forest Service is completely broke and overwhelmed with a backlog of work, the Park Service is again trimming budgets and altering service, and the State Parks are only surviving thru the sale of Discover passes. Who do you propose pay for the type of massive database you suggest? And it would be massive, more in line with those managed by the USGS rather than the USFS. Before you post anything more, please clarify and be specific about who is going to pay for your proposal. Fees for the concessionaires only get passed to the users, triggering other societal issues. Come up with something else.

[jeff_ward]

[FUN CH]

Tresle, public tax money already supports commercial private business operating on public land unless you believe that the 3 percent fee that the guide/outfitters pay completely pays for the proportunate cost for forest service buildings, heat, cooling, lights, vehicles, equipment, pay, pensions, health care, etc, etc. Maybe your argument should be for the shutting down of all commercial private business operating on public land to save some cash? But then we would loose all the positive benefits that these businesses bring to local areas and our out door community. What i'm asking for is transparency, that would add zero cost to the tax payer because these systems are already in place and would bring about added public safety benefits. By the way, according to the FS 2002 EA, nchs- our local mountain guides- are required to provide information to the public concerning conditions they are observing in the BC. That language is reflected in both the nch and ncmg special use permits although the nch operating plan, which is written by the outfitter, contains language to the contrary. But rest assured that a few local BC skiers will continue to endure the insults, as we have done in the past, and push forward on these public safety and other conflict issues when these permits come up for renewal. Stupid us, we see it as some sort of duty, required by our code of ethics. Ye

[FUN CH]

I view these historical incidents as important data that help support current observational data. Yesterday i recieved an observation that no surface hoar was being maintained above 3200' feet, hwy 20 to cutthroat and that good corn snow was to be found on south facing aspects with a strong 4'' melt freeze crust. From my past mental maps, i can extrapolate and correlate that observation to other known hazard areas and past observations and start to form a hazard analysis subject to change as i get out into the field when the dust on crust starts to feel like powder as bonds form and settlement occurs in the new storm layers. Of course i'm being optimistic that we get some of the stuff. I did trigger a snow slide today. But since it occured on my solar panals, i won't rush to any conclusions. 1'' crown.

[trestle]

Go away troll. This has gotten old.

[podenski]

Some useful resources that are more relevant I think: Current avalanche conditions: http://www.nwac.us/ Topo map with slope angle overlay in color-coded format: http://caltopo.com/map.html#ll=48.84819,-121.6884&z=15&b=t&o=f,r&n=1,0.25&a=sf Since avalanches typically occur between 30 - 50 degrees the slope shading will indicate 'safe' areas. That is to say, areas where you'd be unlikely to trigger an avalanche. 'safe' because you also need to pay attention to what's above the area you're traveling in. Obviously, there's much more to learn and know but that's about the best there is to work with now. Certainly the nwac forecast is quite an improvement over what I had to work with when I first started mountaineering in PNW circa 1975.

[FUN CH]