Proof the mountains don't care...

With a lot of new snow here in SW Montana it is no surprise that the avy danger is through the roof. Two accidents within the week in drastically different situations and both with bad outcomes.

The point of this? Take what you will, keep your head up out there. Sometimes the danger is right in your face yet people ignore it, and get away with it more or less. Other times you think your doing it right but you may not be, most times nature doesn't call you out on it, sometimes she will.

Saddle Peak, seemingly all care thrown to the wind, injured but not killed:
http://mtavalanche.com/sites/default...ent_Public.pdf

Outside Cook City. Playing it safe, not a terribly obvious slide path from below, buried and killed:
http://mtavalanche.com/sites/default...e%20Public.pdf

Sad.

"The victim was wearing an ABS air bag but was unable to deploy it." Unfortunate. Stay safe everyone, and keep those cords ready to rip.

From the 2/24 Saddle Peak report:

"All three knew the avalanche danger was rated HIGH, which means human triggered slides were very
likely. All three were very familiar with the sidecountry terrain. Skier1 was with a party that triggered a
large avalanche on the west side of the range on February 21st when the danger was also HIGH. On the
24th they left the ski area boundary and hiked past the main summit of Saddle Peak to its south summit,
a short distance away."

Attachment 111036

Clearly, Skier1 is immune to slides and has nothing to worry about.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by bfree

"The victim was wearing an ABS air bag but was unable to deploy it."

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Doesn't sound like it would of made a difference. He wasn't carried anywhere, but was stalled on his sled near the toe of the slide path, and it came down and buried him from above. Shitty timing - the report states that it was likely a natural.