Today wrapped up another AIARE 1 Avalanche Course with interesting snow-pack conditions and great weather, Mother Nature is really keeping the avy course season going strong this year! Our first day focused on recognizing avalanche terrain and learning about the different types of avalanches along with what to do if someone in your party is caught in an avalanche. On Day 2 while we learned about how dynamic the winter snow-pack can be we stepped outside early morning to look at some beautiful 3mm Stellar snow crystals, and talked about how they could act as a buried weak layer in some situations:

Later that day we went on a short tour along the south east side of Mt. Willard and saw some great wind effected snow, deep “whales” from earlier intense blowing snow, shooting cracks on some small slabs, and evidence of last weeks rain event.

Today we met at Pinkham Notch Visitor Center, and after a trip planning session we skinned up to the snow study plot below Hermit Lake.

After we got our first look at the Ravine we re-fueled with some food & H20 then headed up into the floor of Tuckerman Ravine.

Along the way we had some interesting Hand Shear results along with positive ski cuts that produced impressive shooting cracks. We were happy that we were on low angle terrain given those results!

Once we reached the floor we soon noticed a size-able crown below The Chute. USFS Snow Ranger Jeff Lane was investigating it by conducting tests in the crown and exploring higher above it while fellow snow ranger Frank Carus spotted him from over by Right Gully.

Sticking to our original tour plan we started heading up a skin track to Right Gully.

We stopped to the right of the mouth of Right Gully for a closer look at the snow-pack.

Results were quite impressive, as we got repeated CTE, Q2 40-60cm down (depending on which pit), on an almost indistinguishable layer interface (wasn’t the crust from the previous weeks rain). This matched up with what USFS Snow Ranger Frank Carus had shared with us on our ascent, and was enough evidence for us that even though the bulletin only put Right Gully at “Moderate” it was above our level of risk acceptance to enter the gully proper. We decided to ski one at a time from this high point back to the floor of the ravine. 3 turns into the slope I buried a ski in the heavy snow and face planted pretty hard… first fall of the season! Given the pit results I did look up quickly to make sure my tumble didn’t tip the scale, but all was well and worth a chuckle.

After we regrouped at the floor of the ravine we made for the Little Headwall, which had a few dicey spots as last weeks rain had blown it out and there were some gaping holes that required some careful navigation. The rest of the Sherbie was pretty enjoyable, though the bottom half will be very happy with the new snow coming tonight into tomorrow!

My tour notes from the day:

Well, only 2 courses left this season. Next weekend’s course has 1 or 2 spots left in it. If you want it you can book it online here. This incoming storm is sure to produce great conditions for the next course, which can be hit or miss this late in the season!

See you all on the mountain!

“Spring is in the air” would be a common theme as we hit near record highs during our 8th AIARE 1 Avalanche Course of the season which concluded today. Despite the warm temperatures our snow-pack is certainly still dynamic as we got to experience a wide variety of conditions in the three days we spent together. Day 1 saw some productive morning discussions about different types of avalanches and avalanche terrain in general before heading outside for some great companion rescue practice.

Day 2 was VERY interesting as despite the warm temps it was very cold, clear, and calm the night before… so driving up to the Highland Center I was a bit excited to see obvious Near Surface Faceting all over the place from Bartlett to the Highland Center. I was even more stoked to see aggressive Surface Hoar all over the field right next to our classroom. I realized the warm temps and strong solar radiation expected would destroy it early so I grabbed some pics with my iPhone before class started.

While I have found small pockets before this stuff is a bit rare here in our windy “Arctic Maritime” snow climate and this was the largest area I have ever seen covered in it. Some of them measured 5mm in height, which is pretty impressive. An hour and a half later when we left the classroom to check it our the daytime warming and sun had destroyed it. I was glad to have the photos!

That afternoon we headed south along the east side of Mt. Willard and quickly noticed some huge “pinwheeling” from the strong solar radiation we where getting. I would call it “prolific” as it was everywhere. In some areas it looked like debris, but was just massive amounts of “pinwheels” and “rollerballs”. Some where quite big!

Other than just indicating strong solar radiation these little features can often preclude wet loose snow avalanches, and possible wet slabs if unstable conditions exist. On a slope covered in pinwheels Keith demonstrated measuring slope angle with his ski poles.

Minutes later we wrapped around to the more southern exposure of Mt. Willard and found fresh debris from a small slab avalanche that came down just to the right of Cinema Gully and almost reached the train tracks…

We finished the day looking at some layers on a small NW slope and found some buried Melt-Freeze crusts with free water sitting on top. Compression Tests were rather inconclusive.

Day 3 started at the Pinkham Notch Visitor Center. After accessing the bulletin we made a trip plan for Tuckerman Ravine.

At HoJo’s we chatted with Lead USFS Snow Ranger Christopher Joosen about the conditions and his and his fellow rangers job on the mountain, then we continued up the Tuck’s trail towards are original objective of Lobster Claw Gully.

We bumped into Frank Carus, another USFS Snow Ranger who pointed out an almost indistinguishable old debris pile that had come out of Lobster Claw the week before.

After some group discussion the majority voted to change our plan due to the strong solar radiation and warm temps possibly making things a bit iffy on the right side, and fell back on our more conservative plan to head over towards  Left Gully and The Chute. The decision was made to spread out when crossing the main run-out.

We got a good vantage to see the debris and the crown at the top of Right Gully from the skier triggered avalanche the day before.

We chose the slope between Left Gully and The Chute to poke around. We got some super positive hand shear results on a 25cm pencil hard slab sitting on graupel that was mentioned in Friday’s bulletin. That got us excited to dig further and we got tons of positive CT results along with a RB4, MB. A student sent me this video of the Rutchsblock.

youtu.be/8WTVJqTuEPE

I’ll upload the hand shears and Compression Tests later.

After we descended via Little Headwall and Sherburne we had a good course close back at PNVC. I stuck around for the annual NH Search & Rescue dinner and a great presentation by the Director of Summit Operations, Cyrena-Marie Briede, on her work in Alaska.

More to come on this event, along with the videos from the Handshears, CT’s, and Rutschblock tests so please check back!

Last Friday, March 1st, we started another 3-Day AIARE 1 course. March 1st seems to be a dangerous day, as just 2 years ago a very experienced skiier took a huge ride in Gulf of Slides. This year a very experienced local climbing guides party triggered an avalanche while he was ski guiding in Tuckerman Ravine and a solo ice climber triggered an avalanche in Huntington Ravine that was fatal. Until I see official reports from the USFS I am with-holding talking more about these incidents but I will update links here as more info becomes available. In the meantime let’s reflect on the tragedy that has occurred; a 24 year old climber has lost his life pursuing his passion. Without a doubt lessons will be learned for this, but let none of us think we couldn’t have made the same mistakes of either party.

As usual we met at the AMC Highland Center in Crawford Notch. After introductions we took a look at the Gulf of Slides case study before breaking into small groups to learn what we could from the incident and consider a structured decision making process like AIARE’s “DMF”.

That afternoon we spent a few hours outside practicing Companion Rescue, i.e. how to efficiently rescue your partner if they are buried in an avalanche.  After some classroom the morning of Day 2 we drove over to Marshfield Station at the base of the Cog Railway to begin our Observation Outing. After a weather observation and beacon function check at the trail-head we started our ascent.

We soon noticed some interesting Surface Hoar growing on some twigs, and along the rails of the Cog and to a small extent the closest snow surfaces to the railway.

While I tried to wrap my head around why this was so prolific during considerably overcast conditions we climbed up to 3,800 feet and took another weather observation at Waumbek Tank. About 45 minutes later we arrived at our high point objective, Jacob’s Ladder, and poked around in the snow a bit looking at the layering and learning about Hand Hardness scales and Compression Tests.

It was a pretty sweet ski back down to the trail-head where we reviewed our choices and expectations and made plans for the following day on the other side of Mount Washington.

The next day we met at Pinkham Notch Visitor Center and broke into small groups again to work on a trip plan for the day. The avalanche bulletin for the day was complex, and even included the line “The avalanche conditions are paydirt for avalanche practitioners, guides, and educators.” Perfect for our goals of moving through complex avalanche terrain, making observations about snowpack, weather, and avalanches!

After reviewing our trip options created that morning and updating our weather expectations we decided we could stick to Plan “A” and set a skin track up the Little Headwall to get into the ravine.

With the majority of the ravine rated “Considerable” we stayed low and traversed the main run-out by spreading out with eyes on the start zones of anything that looked sketchy…

We got some interesting Compression Test results and a eye-opening Rutshblock (RB3 MB 18cm down followed by RB4 MB 38cm down). Unfortunately we didn’t film it. After wrapping up our observations we dropped the Little Headwall and enjoyed the packed powder run down the Sherbie… back at PNVC we debriefed the day and the course in general. My esoteric field notes from the day;

Well, only 4 weekends left to the avalanche course season, two are sold out. Winter is not leaving as fast as it did last year. Safe “Spring Skiing” conditions were already here this time last year, but are weeks away looking at the long range forecast. Read the bulletin. If you are unsure, scale back your ambition, and come back when conditions match your confidence and understanding!

See you on the mountain!

Last night I got home after conducting an AIARE 1 Course with fellow guide and manager of our Lake Placid EMS Schools location, Dan Sandberg over in the High Peaks region of the Adirondacks. It was great to work with Dan in an area I was not familiar with. Even better, a size-able Nor’ Easter commonly called “Nemo” in the major news outlets arrived the same night I did and laid down close to two feet of snow for us to recreate on.

Dan had arranged a great classroom space at the Adirondack “Loj”, a great facility run by the Adirondack Mountain Club, very similar to our local AMC Highland Center and Joe Dodge Lodge.

11 students, including EMS Schools Guide Dustin Ulrich, 3 EMS Store Guides from our Middletown, RI and Nanuet, NY stores, an educational trip leader and hut manager for ADK, an Adventure Education Major, a couple military guys, and all around winter sports enthusiasts all helped create a great environment to start learning about decision making in the back-country.

On our 2nd Day we toured up the Memorial Highway on the north-side of Whiteface Mountain.

Along the way we practiced making weather observations and quick snow-pack observations like pole probing, ski-cutting, and boot penetration in the cold new storm snow that had blanketed the area. Unstable snow was definitely around as we experienced some whumping and were able to get small shooting cracks on some convex areas off to the side of the road. We were quite safe as we kept our slope angle well below anything risky. After looking more closely at the snow at 3,800 feet and learning about tilt tests, hand hardness scale, and compression tests, we enjoyed the 3.26 mile glide back down to the parking lot.

Later I shared my field observations with the group and we talked about the relevancy of our results.

On the 3rd day we spent some time in the classroom looking at some avalanche terrain and figuring out possible route selections based on conditions, and talked about travel techniques to help further mitigate risk. One of the bigger challenges of carrying out an avalanche course in the Adirondacks is the access to the actual avalanche paths is a bit remote, so we decided it would be more valuable to get some more Companion Rescue practice in on the last day and headed out across Heart Lake to a nice back-country ski trail to run through some more detailed rescue scenarios.

I took some video of one of the scenarios and uploaded it here:

http://youtu.be/kc3JTIaqtoU

A disclaimer, we only had the recent 18 inches of snow to practice on so we could not bury the beacons at a realistic depth. I also threw a big curve-ball at this group with a surface victim which ended up creating some great discussion on the realities of a possible rescue. The next run these three did went a lot smoother. Everyone in the course walked away feeling this was something they could practice a lot more of with their friends, and that was exactly what we hoped!

I must admit I was concerned about meeting all the learning objectives of an AIARE 1 Course in an area I wasn’t familiar with especially with very low snow depth in relation to seasonal norms there. Based on the course feedback forms we received we met our goals, and that, combined with co-teaching with a new instructor, and excellent constructive feedback from the participants, made this course a huge personal learning experience and I’m excited to return next winter for another course in the Dacks’!

Now it’s time to start prepping for the AIARE 2 Course that starts this Friday.

If you enjoy these course reports the best way you can let me know is by subscribing at the link top right. The 2nd best way if you don’t want to subscribe is to leave a quick comment… especially if you were in the course!

Safe travels,