Thanks to Slim and Jeeper for pointing out the location of that hill. Puts it a little more in perspective when you realize you've been there and seen it before.
Rode out of Avalanche (Moved from Mountain/Powder)
- Thread starter dgoetz
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I thought that hill looked familiar. We were there about a month ago. It looks like the wind has been blowing up there. We stopped in the the little valley there between the hills, but climb this one. There wasn't enought snow when we were there. Good thing you made it out alive.
Kudos to you and your wife. First for posting the video for us all to learn from your mishap, and second for maintaining your cool and responding with logical answers in the face of relentless and unnecessary bashing.
One thing for sure, you will never forget the image in your head of the snow right as it starts to break and you realize you are now going to be caught in an avalanche. It happened to me this fall while out skiing. We have all the gear, checked the reports, dug a pit, avy level one certified...etc. But we made a mistake and the fracture happened right under my feet as I was standing there watching my buddy ski (bad place to stand obviously). I have relived that moment a million times, and it was a huge wake up call for me and my ski partners. I'm sure you feel the same way.
I'm glad you came out safe and are here to tell the tale.
One thing for sure, you will never forget the image in your head of the snow right as it starts to break and you realize you are now going to be caught in an avalanche. It happened to me this fall while out skiing. We have all the gear, checked the reports, dug a pit, avy level one certified...etc. But we made a mistake and the fracture happened right under my feet as I was standing there watching my buddy ski (bad place to stand obviously). I have relived that moment a million times, and it was a huge wake up call for me and my ski partners. I'm sure you feel the same way.
I'm glad you came out safe and are here to tell the tale.
Yes good info ! Thanks everyone!
glade your ok but man you are lucky
very lucky indeed thanks for the ride
My prob with this guy and his avy vid is his bragging of all his years experience and his mad avy dodging skills. Skills my arse, you got lucky, you rode it out cause it let you ride it out not because you ride 7000 miles a year. I dont really care if you go and risk your own life, thats your choice. My problem with this thread is what you are teaching people, and that is the notion that experience and avy dodging skills can protect you in this situation. Take a look at the Trennis Baer video and tell me if any amount of skill level would have helped him ride it out. Avys are like stds, the only way to protect yourself for sure is abstinence. No way in hell I woulda climbed that hill. If you wanna ride in the mountains and live to see your kids kids then you better retrain your brain and learn to have fun without big hillclimbing, thats all there is to learn. I dont ride big hills anymore, I got out with good friends on sweet sleds and play our guts out. We pass big hills left right and center and somehow we have fun and love the sport just the same.
yes ickman, I can tell you a couple of informative things
First of all, Had he hit this hill early in the morning, the odds of it sliding would have been less. Once the sun hit the snow and started loosening it up, the potential for it to slide became greater.
Then to top it off, we have a condition where; This year we had a freeze layer close to the dirt, and received a lot of snow on top of it. any slide has the potential of being a big slide.
second, If he would have gone all of the way up this probably would not have released. By turning out, he created a fracture line, and also increased the pressure on the snow as he traveled across the hill. by the time he turned down hill, the whole slide was in progress.
What I see that He did right, is he traveled to the edge of the slide. He got out of the gut of the slide. If he would have gone straight down, the slide would have caught him for sure.
First of all, Had he hit this hill early in the morning, the odds of it sliding would have been less. Once the sun hit the snow and started loosening it up, the potential for it to slide became greater.
Then to top it off, we have a condition where; This year we had a freeze layer close to the dirt, and received a lot of snow on top of it. any slide has the potential of being a big slide.
second, If he would have gone all of the way up this probably would not have released. By turning out, he created a fracture line, and also increased the pressure on the snow as he traveled across the hill. by the time he turned down hill, the whole slide was in progress.
What I see that He did right, is he traveled to the edge of the slide. He got out of the gut of the slide. If he would have gone straight down, the slide would have caught him for sure.
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More Preaching and self righteousness is just what we all need, so if we don't all ride like you and your buddies on your high priced turbo's (sweet sleds as you say) then we aren't having fun? I guess I will be put my old beater away and pick up a different sport. I guess if a adult wants to ride his sled and makes a decision that a hill is safe to climb and does so, even if that goes bad, it was his decision to make. I can also see how riding "skills" would have helped him in this particular situation, if his was a complete newby he probably would have been more prowen to be bucked off. Wether or not he made the right decision to climb that hill is his business. I have 2 little girls at home and once they were born I stopped climbing hills and we just completely boondock now and I'm good with that, last thing I would ever do is question how someone wants to ride. People need to get off their high horse and stop fawking preaching down to other people.
What were the air temperatures? Just because sun is on the slope doesn't mean it's loosening up. Most problems arise when it is warm enough for the snow to become moist or even wet and you then get small wetslides early and larger ones later due to water on the weak layer or bed surface.
In a thread that got deleted, i asked these folks what kinda pits they dug. No reply. You are telling me there is a buried crust from early season. Without any tests that is a bad sign. Maybe it's bonded well, maybe it's not but that right there should signal anybody to at least do some stability tests and treat all hills in the area with caution.
I think some are confusing preaching with trying to find out what caused this and also trying to educate people. Even though it was his decision doesn't mean it was a well informed one. I would bet most people that die in an avalanche looked at the hill they were on and thought to themselves if it slid, it would probably kill me, but then did it anyways.
I think looking at the decisions made and what happend in an avalanche is a great way for others to be educated. Sometimes this comes across as armchair quarterbacking. If we keep the conversation in a civil format, a lot can be learned.
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cobbycat
ACCOUNT CLOSED
if there are other people on the mountain, that personal choice that is "his decision to make" could kill others, either caught in the same slide or trying to rescue the guy and it sliding again. I wish you guys would understand that your bad decision affects all riders on the mountain!! so is it really "his decision to make"?
great post you hit the nail right on the head
Do you climb hills? If you do, then everytime you make a decision to climb are you endangering everyone else on the mountain..is that really what you want to say! If it is, that is one hell of a responsibility you carry on your shouldlers everytime you ride. You can have all the smarts in the world, carry the best equipment, dig pits, check the wind, sun, snow load etc...but it all comes down to a "decision" to climb or not to climb....once you make that "decision" there might or might not be a consequence. People climb hills all the time, it's part of riding for a lot of people and it's their decision to do so, not mine to preach at them about doing it or not.
I used to ride Cooke City a lot and know all about avalanches, I have seen them up close, had friends in them and I want no part of it...so I make the "decision" not to period. This is couple of friends of mine in Cooke City quite a few years ago.
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cobbycat
ACCOUNT CLOSED
Do you climb hills? If you do, then everytime you make a decision to climb are you endangering everyone else on the mountain..is that really what you want to say! If it is, that is one hell of a responsibility you carry on your shouldlers everytime you ride. You can have all the smarts in the world, carry the best equipment, dig pits, check the wind, sun, snow load etc...but it all comes down to a "decision" to climb or not to climb....once you make that "decision" there might or might not be a consequence. People climb hills all the time, it's part of riding for a lot of people and it's their decision to do so, not mine to preach at them about doing it or not.
I used to ride Cooke City a lot and know all about avalanches, I have seen them up close, had friends in them and I want no part of it...so I make the "decision" not to period. This is couple of friends of mine in Cooke City quite a few years ago.
hey, someone finally gets it!!! I'm not saying "don't climb hills". I'm saying that we need to make these decisions wisely and that they do affect others. many others.
And, yes, we do have one hell of a responsibility in making these decisions, and the sooner we all figure this out, the better snowmobiling will be for all!
F
Flange
Well-known member
That sums it all up pretty good.
In what part of my post did I say your sled had to be a new turbo to be sweet? My Buddy Kevs sled is an 07 600 with single pipe and I consider it ONE of those sweet sleds. One of my other buddies rides an 03 MTN Cat and that sled is cool as hell. My boy rides a 95 phazer, should I go on? Dont go putting words in my mouth fella, I am anything but an Elitist, I think all sleds which are cared for and ridden with pride are sweet, including the 383.
This whole avalanche controversy is an enormous source of differing opinions. We all need to speak and learn and decide for ourselves. If we did nothing but blow praise up this guys arse then others might get the impression that what he did was OK and responsible. Maybe to some it is. Its like the global warming lie, if people only hear one side of the story then most people will believe that what they hear is true without making up their minds for themselves. You heard me say I dont care if he risks his own life, I am concerned with what his attitude might be teaching others, especially young people.
As for peoples decisions to climb unsafe hills not affecting anyone but themselves, that is not true. There will come a day when a search and rescue team is buried and or killed and then there will almost certainly be talk of outlawing and or restricting the sport. Avys always involve more than just the person buried and they sometimes bury those who werent even climbing the hill.
How different would this conversation be if this guy had been buried and died.
M
MTdream
Well-known member
agree with you Freak, this mindset is ludicrous.... (my response is not directed to anyone at all, just the mindset that seems to be, sadly, too pervasive)
This "only affects himself" lie is not close to accurate...
every year, people are killed who are not the people doing the climb...people in run out, people stuck on hill while someone else is climbing...people going to help others...
ask a few of the wives/kids if their hubbies actions only affected him...Ask the friends whose life is altered from spending an hour trying to resuscitate their buddy...
I can tell you first hand, there is a color to a persons skin (whom has ceased to breath) that is indelibly burned into my brain. I care to never see that color again.
flame away, but this mindset is one of the core issues...and it is based upon ignorance and arrogance....either you dont want to know what can happen so you dont educate yourself on ramifications of your actions or... you know and think your smarter/know more/are better than those that have died before you...
What is a "safe hill"...we have all seen hills slide that we had never seen before or that we thought were safe, (there have been many posts over the years on here about them). You can't just pick out this hill as safe and this one is not. Even the avalanche experts just put out warnings, they don't know for exact when and where. So what if in this case there was no warning and the avalanche season wasn't as deadly as this one and that guy posted this, would you be okay with what happened to him, just call him a lucky bugger for riding it out and be careful out there. MTDREAM..I for one never said anything about avy deaths not affecting peoples families, of course it does, death of any type devestates the people that are left behind. I don't even climb anymore but this thread just got me the way people ripped on this guy for climbing a hill that he decided was safe, something that we all have done or do to one extent or the other. Then to top if off you have another thread about guy's in Revy climing massive chutes and that's okay cause they "dug a pit and everything looked safe etc..) and to them it looked okay so they made a decision to climb and it wall worked out ok and they had a great day and took some incredible pictures. Did they endanger everyone else around them including other beelers in the area, the Revy Search and Rescue too by climbing that day? It's just not a simple black and white issue in my mind, if it was that simple then evey single beeler that climbs hills has to stop right now or they are putting others in danger. There is no middle ground on this, there is no "we dug a pit and it looks safe"....there is no "the conditions looked safe"...there is no "well I have never seen this hill slide before"...there is no "well the hill was full of track and pounded down so we thought if was safe"...all that doesn't matter because it's just an opinion or decision that is made. I'm not trying to argue or offend anyone either, I'm just making a point that I think this particular person that started this thread was treated like chit by lot's of people and didn't deserve all that came his and his wife's way.
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