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Early season avi in Chamonix
- kamtron
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To tamper the stoke
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- Randito
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- AlpineRose
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- kamtron
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- Blizz Mountain
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- kamtron
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- BenJ
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- Nate Frederickson
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I've been taught to come in with some speed and apply pressure where you think the tension zone is where a crown might break. If it's a pretty uniform slope then pumping a bit while cutting across aiming toward someplace I think is safe to stop. If there are obvious tension zones or convexities, powering into short turns there.
I certainly wouldn't want to rely on ski cutting to stabilize a high consequence slope I thought was unstable, but I like it for testing slopes that I believe are OK to ski already. Can't argue against a belay in a high consequence situation but seems impractical except for small starting zones. Checking the snow profile while on belay and using that info to decide whether to retreat or ski test seems sensible.
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- hefeweizen
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1) Likelihood v Consequence: Regardless of how certain the skier was that he/she would cause an avalanche, the consequence of getting caught in that terrain is almost certainly death if you go into those very deep terrain traps (crevasses).
2) Terrain Configuration: Generally, you only want to ski cut one starting zone at a time that you can get into and out of with momentum. This person was basically skiing through multiple starting zones, and clearly hadn't reached a safe zone when they stopped.
The person was probably surprised at the size of slide they caused. To the comment of stopping and digging a snow profile mid-slope: I'm guessing you weren't suggesting that you do this mid ski-cut? You want to have a well informed opinion of what the snow profile is going to look like before you put yourself in the terrain, created by the many moving observations you've made along the way. It's hard to tell exactly what the crown depth is in this instance, but it's well within the range of questionable in terms of a slab that you would attempt to intentionally trigger.
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- kamtron
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- Nate Frederickson
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I can't fault their applied technique given their decision to "do something". I wouldn't consider the terrain crossed to be multiple starting zones, so we can disagree on that. No point stopping and starting again in that particular situation, IMO. Standing on the rib where he stopped was about as safe a place to stop as could have been chosen. Would it be wise to find a safer spot? Yes. But there wasn't one available. He was wise to stop above the convexity along the crest of the rib IMO. Basically I think what they did was quite dangerous but perhaps more thoughtful than it first appears.
No, don't stop in the middle of a ski cut to dig a pit. Dig a pit on a questionable high consequence slope with a belay.
Would I have done what they did? No, they were playing with fire big time, I expect they have a very high risk tolerance, didn't know any better, or are simply still in their twenties.
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- Scotsman
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Highly respected I believe.
He has a facebook page and features in a lot of videos.
www.unfilteredskiing.com/video/e03-backyard
Looks to me like he knew exactly what he was doing.
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- Nate Frederickson
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"Doesn't matter if you are a pro skier or a big name, it's just the same for us, we see the guy who loves skiing"
"Everyone is seeing all this rad stuff from Chamonix, but actually what we do 90% of the time is ski powder with no one around"
Sounds like a good guy & no doubt he understands the risks.
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- hefeweizen
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We all have the spots that we visit frequently that we're comfortable ski cutting in a variety of conditions. But, if the question is "Was this a good/safe ski cut", and/or an example of a technique that inexperienced folks should emulate in similar terrain, in my opinion the answer is no.
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- kamtron
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- mBraun
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There is a break in the video. He ended his ski cut slightly higher than where the video resumes. He is actually coming back and is making a new track about 3-ft downslope from the initial ski cut. When it releases, he takes a couple quick side steps uphill. The release occurred along his initial ski cut mostly from the middle to lower arcs and did not release at the upper arcs. The area immediately below him fractures but does not release.
Conclusions:
There was a delay (maybe a minute or more?) between his ski cut and the fracture/release.
It he had cut 20-ft higher, the slope would not have released.
If he had cut 20-ft lower, he would have been in the upper part of the slide.
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One fall line turn from eternity 8-|
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