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Outside Magazine February 2000
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Anatomy of a Slide (Cont.)
Determining Snow Ability
Call
Local avalanche centers have snowpack and weather information. Check in early and often. Evaluating snow stability is a seasonlong endeavor.

Dig
A snow pit will tell you two things: where there's a weak layer, and how unstable it's making the slope. Dig down at least six feet. Depth hoar looks like granules of sugar: It's multifaceted, it glitters, it doesn't make good snowballs. It can kill you. Once you've found the weak layer, perform the rutschblock test (taught in any avalanche school) to determine the slab's shear strength.

Look
"If you see slide activity on similar aspects," Birkeland says, "you know the snow is unstable. You don't even have to dig a pit."

Listen
A hollow sound underneath your weight means there's a strong layer over a weak layer. This is bad. If you hear a whoomph, the strong layer has just collapsed the weak layer. This is worse. No noise is good noise.

Stomp
Extend one leg and smack the snow with your ski tip. If cracks shoot out, the top layer is cohesive and could fracture—two essential components of a slab avalanche.

Repeat Even if everything is telling you to ski that slope, you might have missed something. "It's very rare for a mystery slide to kill someone," Fredston says. "There are usually plenty of clues. It's taking only one piece of information from one particular area that kills people." —MARC PERUZZI

Get Schooled
Alaska Avalanche School
Anchorage, Alaska 907.345.3566

American Avalanche Institute
Wilson, Wyoming 307.733.3315

Canadian Avalanche Association Training School
Revelstoke, BC 250.837.2433
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