Backcountry Avalanche Safety: Skiers, Climbers, Boarders and Snowshoers

Snow avalanches are the greatest source of danger for mountain travelers in winter. This book is essential reading for winter backcountry enthusiasts who venture into terrain where avalanches are common. In spite of the increasing sophistication of avalanche-hazard forecasting, an alarming number of people die every year in backcountry avalanche accidents. Winter outdoor pursuits have changed substantially in recent years: advances in ski technology have opened up new out-of-bounds areas to free-riders, hi-tech snowshoes allow travel in avalanche terrain and powerful, lightweight machines encourage snowmobilers to high mark on ever steeper slopes.This new edition of Avalanche Safety focuses on two basic user groups: those who wish to avoid avalanche hazard by careful route-finding and those who deliberately seek steep slopes to ski or board. Using color photographs, along with detailed charts, graphs and diagrams, the author clearly explains the basics of snow and avalanches, identifies avalanche terrain, promotes trip planning, describes the skills needed to travel through avalanche terrain and provides guidelines for skiing and boarding steep slopes, with an emphasis on managing risk.