Tools, skill essential for backcountry safety

This season I plan to venture into the backcountry to experience a different type of snowboarding that the resorts can't quite offer. But before I do I know I will need to learn a lot about how to navigate possibly unstable snow.

If you're like me and also thinking of exploring this season, taking an avalanche course is the best way to educate yourself. But to give you an idea of where to start, I've compiled some basic information.

Mountainzone.com stresses the importance of understanding the fundamentals. Avalanche conditions form as a result of the interaction of terrain, weather, and snowpack. All of the information needed to predict snow stability can be obtained from these three.

Storms are the source of most of the world's avalanches. The combination of new snowfall and wind creates the unstable layering that result in slab avalanches because the rate at which stress is added to the snowpack exceeds the rate at which these new layers can gain strength.

Also, a prolonged period of cold and clear weather can substantially weaken the snowpack and create a hair trigger situation.

Of course, there is a lot of other knowledge that is essential to backcountry safety. Testing your knowledge and skills in controlled practice sessions is important, but also requires some essential tools:

• Avalanche Beacon - A portable transceiver that reflects a signal from an aboveground transceiver, making known the exact location of the device in case the carrier is buried in an avalanche.
• Snow Shovel- A small, portable shovel with a detachable handle that can be easily carried in a pack while in the backcountry.
• Probe - long skinny pole used to measure horizons in snow layering and locate avalanche victims
• Survival Blanket - waterproof, lightweight blanket that retains a maximum amount of body height to keep you warm


All of this equipment can be purchased at backcountry.com and discount sites like steep and cheap.