Tools of the Trade--avy gear--what do you carry?

My wife and I have been using the Pieps DSP beacons this year. We previously used Ortovox F1 analog beacons, so I can't compare them to the Trackers.

The Pieps DSP is very easy to use. My wife & I raced several times in our backyard with one of us using the Pieps and the other the Ortovox. The Pieps user was consistently faster because they could pretty much run in the direction that the beacon pointed. The Ortovox user had to stop to re-aim from time to time. We are both pretty skilled with the analog Ortovoxes, so it wasn't a case of operator error.

My seven & nine year old daughters were both able to quickly find a buried beacon using the Pieps after only a few seconds of instruction.

The multi-burial detection functions do not work with 100% consistency. The beacon has a scan function, in which it can assess an area and tell you how many beacons are buried within a 5 meter range, a 20 meter range, and a 50 meter range. That function seems to work quite well. In search mode, however, it sometimes reports multiple beacons even if there is only one transmitting. This mostly happened when we were searching for our old Ortovox analog beacons. You are also supposed to be able to suppress the signal from each beacon that you find in a multiple burial. We weren't able to consistently suppress the signals from our older analog beacons.

I don't particularly like the Pieps harness, although I'm getting used to it. I found the old Ortovox harness more comfortable. The Ortovox was also designed so that it was turned on by putting on the harness, so it was almost impossible to put the beacon on without also turning it on. I miss that feature. My wife & I have both skied all day and then realized that our beacons were not sending. Hopefully that's a mistake that we'll each only make once. We're much more careful about turning them on, now, and about checking each other.

We did not get the advanced versions with temp/compass/altimeter. The user manual states that the unit does not send while it is performing any of those functions. It does automatically revert to sending after two minutes.

All-in-all I'm quite happy with these beacons and have ordered two more for my kids.

basics in my pack:
telescoping volie metal bladed shovel (D handle)
long ass Ortovox probe
pieps 457 I have had for a while-want to upgrade to a digital as I thought I was good at searches, but folks with dts beat me now, even newbies
headlamp
cellie
spare socks cuz wet feet suck and can be really dangerous ( skied into a creek once)
Goo ( only for emergencies I really hate the stuff)
spare layer for its late warmth
far too basic first aid kit after reading above.......

heard some stuff on the packs with nitrogen inflated bags designed to float to the top of an avalnache, wondering if anyone has ever tried them out? Obviously woun't replace probe/shovel/beacon combo, but would it be worth the money if you had it?

http://www.abssystem.com/\

seems like a good idea but they cost like $550.

Always in my pack or on my person:

Ortovox F1 Focus
Ortovox probe
Voile Shovel
BD Avalung
Slopemeter
Small extra food stash (2 gels, 2 clif bars, granola)
Sunglasses
TP - always a must
Essentials bag:

• Zip ties
• first aid basics
• hand warmers
• ski strap
• knife
• sun screan
• finger/toenail clippers
• hankerchief
• duct tape

Stuff that's almost always in my pack:

20 meter 8mm rope
Headlamp
small puffy vest
visor

waiting to buy a saw when they are in stock - life link saw

I'm a BC noob and am still putting my kit together. Summer sales and info I've gotten here has lead to this list:

Beacon: BCA tracker
Shovel: BD bobcat
Probe: BD 300cm
Saw: G3 bone saw
MedKit: Generic, not even real sure whats in it.

Maps, food, water, compass, GPS, multitool, Freeride spare parts, extra fleece and gloves are also in my pack.

Still looking into a slope-meter or another compass that will do the job. And possibly a Ructhblock cord or some kind.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Summit

Ibuprofen (reccomended for frostbite)
ASA
NPA adjustable + lube
2x OPA (general sizes)
Abd pad
Coban (most usefull stuff ever)
Asherman chest seal (not always reliable)
Hemcon bandage (if I can ever find one)

---

can you elaborate?
Does Ibuprofen help circulation or just ease the pain?

Also, the other items on the list went over my head.
Would you mind adding some detail?
Thanks

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by This End Up

Still looking into a slope-meter or another compass that will do the job. And possibly a Ructhblock cord or some kind.

---

3mm static with knots in it does the trick without cutting up your probe. it is also much less expensive.

Just curious, why not just use the voile? is it harder to dig pits with the voile? It seems that carrying two shovels is a bit excessive, since they aren't really "specialty" tools for pits/avy victims?

The ortavox fits in my pack in one peice and snow saw fits on the handle of that shovel. So it is quick and easy to use. I just don't trust the lexan blade in an emergancy situation like a burial and the volie rides well in the Dakine pack in two peices. Its over redundant and I will probly change packs next season. I would like a life link hymalian and a saw that fits on the handle but it won't fit in the guide pack well. Anyone rockin an Osprey pack? The switch packs look sweet.

sfb, i don't have the ospry but the bd frenzy 28L fits my d9 with just the handle sticking out. i think those two shovels have the same dimensions. i don't know too many other packs that will fit a blade that large.

The d9 got a saw attachment that fits on the handle also?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by skifishbum

The d9 got a saw attachment that fits on the handle also?

---

nope, i've had one before. i finally came to this realization:
(not all info relavant)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by AltaPowderDaze

i have one of these and i only use it when i need to dig pits. https://secure.visi.com/wasatchtouring/images/saws.gif the less i get out, the more pits i dig. i have had one that is in shovel but it was too short for most things. you can either make your own like a few threads around here show or you can find any coarse tooth saw at the hardware store that will pack ok. some folding pruning saws may work.

---

That looks real similiar to the otravox saw I use only it will only attach to the ortavox shovel handle. Dug a hell of a lot of pits this season. A good exercise while takin the "safety break". Gots to go see if those doggie avalanche victem volunteer sessions will snag me some final lift rides while patrol is breaking down. Thanks for the info. Hope to see ya in the BC cause "it aint over". Not even close

[QUOTE=skifishbum Anyone rockin an Osprey pack? The switch packs look sweet.[/QUOTE]

I just ordered a switch 25. VERY excited, It should be a great pack. I'll let you know. :D

Someone asked what is the main reason for a saw. IMO they are invaluable for getting good results out of a pit = for isolating the block. ALso if you are holing up somewhere and making an igloo or preparing a wind-block wall then they're awesome. I use the G3 saw.

I'm a big fan of LONG probes - 320mm myself; echo what APD said. There's a lot of burials at or below 2 m - some even survive. Its tough probing 2m of refrozen debris with a 240 mm probe as you only have 40 mm protruding then. The extra weight is worth it IMO. I like the lifelink probe for its quick setup.

Shovel - echo what APD said about the shovel and probe and saw combo - finincky and a pain. Fan of old fashioned heavy metal shovels.

As for tranceivers. Im a big fan of Barryvoxs. Super easy to use. Digital chip kicks in fast. Harness is very well -designed. I like the way i can program it to read both analog and digital which helps a ton in multiple burial situations for me as i was used to analog beacons before..

Compass- invaluable imo when used with a map as you can use it to avoid avvy terrain and for routefinding. Get one with adjustable declination; either mills or degrees are fine. I thought the Spring article about avvy safety and education had a great point about avvy education.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by LeeLau

There's a lot of burials at or below 2 m - some even survive.

---

Data for that champ?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by cj001f

Data for that champ?

---

Here you go: [PDF] Avalanche Probing Re-visited
File Format: PDF/Adobe Acrobat
... Figure 1 Number of avalanche victims found alive and dead by burial depth.
Swiss. burial depths (in metres) and US depths (in feet) are scaled for ...
www.eng.ucalgary.ca/cgi-bin/ TrackIt.pl?Probing_Revisited.pdf - Similar pages

to paraphrase: Using the swiss statistics 85% of the victims found alive were buried less then 1.5m

There's more data out there I'll try to find. One take home message is the importance of trying to swim to get closer to snow surface. If you're buried deep your chances decrease a lot.

Somewhere on the interweb there's also data about trauma % age as cause of fatalities.

the link came out all screwy. I googled avalanche "burial depth" for the link .

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by LeeLau

Here you go: [PDF] Avalanche Probing Re-visited
File Format: PDF/Adobe Acrobat
... Figure 1 Number of avalanche victims found alive and dead by burial depth.
Swiss. burial depths (in metres) and US depths (in feet) are scaled for ...
www.eng.ucalgary.ca/cgi-bin/ TrackIt.pl?Probing_Revisited.pdf - Similar pages

to paraphrase: Using the swiss statistics 85% of the victims found alive were buried less then 1.5m

There's more data out there I'll try to find. One take home message is the importance of trying to swim to get closer to snow surface. If you're buried deep your chances decrease a lot.

Somewhere on the interweb there's also data about trauma % age as cause of fatalities.

---

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by LeeLau

to paraphrase: Using the swiss statistics 85% of the victims found alive were buried less then 1.5m

---

To paraphrase no one(very, very few) buried more than 2m have survived. And if you are doing a beacon search youll be on you knees trying to best differentiate, so the extra length doesnt matter that much for burial depth reasons. If they´re that deep, they are dead, unless they are lucky. Just digging through 2m of snow will take you a bit of time.

That said, I have a 320cm probe.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by cj001f

To paraphrase no one(very, very few) buried more than 2m have survived. And if you are doing a beacon search youll be on you knees trying to best differentiate, so the extra length doesnt matter that much for burial depth reasons. If they´re that deep, they are dead, unless they are lucky. Just digging through 2m of snow will take you a bit of time.

That said, I have a 320cm probe.

---

I know I got sloppy with the stats; however, I would feel terrible if I was so concerned about weight that I skipped the extra length on the probe. The fact there's that small lucky few percent of deep burials that survive and the probability that having a slightly longer probe might make it easier to find them makes it justified to have the longer probe imo. I do think that tranceiver search practises should take place on really hard icy chunky snow so that people get a real good idea of how useless their stupid plastic shovels are and how hard it is to dig through avvy debris. I also think we are somewhat in agreement.

Cheers!

Agreed. Beacons don't find people. Probes find victems. Beacons tell you were to probe. Skimping on probes or probe poles is a mistake. Probe poles do make a handy backup that can be used for other things.

New here, but I like this thread.

BCA Tracker
Skins
BD metal shovel
Probe
Space Blanket
Snow pit cards and 5X magnification
Headlamp
Space blanket
Cell (off)
Food/water
Extra layer

For more serious descents I add a few things

Harness
30m 8mm rope
22cm ice screw
18cm ice screw
Crampons
Ice axe
Prusics
Various regular/locking carabiners
First aid kit

After watching OLN I've concluded all I need is to carry is an avalanche dog.


Anyone know where I can get me one?

^ and the man comes from outta nowhere to make me LOL :biggrin:

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by powderwhore

After watching OLN I've concluded all I need is to carry and avalanche dog.


Anyone know where I can get me one?

---

ha!! thats what i was thinking when i saw the commericals

"your best chance for survival in an avalanche"

maybe we can get a group deal powho, ill take one too :nonono2: