14')

EXPERIENCE AND THE PERCEPTION OF AVALANCHE HAZARD

Ray SmutekThe Mountain School, Renton, WA.

On March 3, 1979, fourteen members of a Seattlemountain climbing club set out for the summit of SuntopMountain. As they neared the top, eight of them left thesecurity of the trees and marched out together onto an openslope. A slab triggered and all eight were swept down thehill. Everyone in the party had attended the standard one­hour avalanche lecture that is part of the club's "wintertravel" course. Several were considered to be highlyexperienced winter mountaineers. The person breaking trailhad been climbing for more than ten years. Interestingly,it was his third avalanche ride.

On April 28, 1975, a mountaineering class from alocal university assembled at Timberline on the old MountSt. Helens. The instructor, a climber of more than tenyears experience, led them into the approaching storm insearch of a site for their overnight snow camp. He selecteda sheltered spot known as the Sugar Bowl, in the lee of alarge, steep moraine. A spontaneous storm release avalanchekilled five of his students.

On January 16, 1974, two experienced instructorsworking for a large wilderness school took 15 students on atwo-week long "expedition" into the Wyoming Tetons. Theirimmediate objective was Glacier Gulch, but they never gotthere. On the 5th day, while traversing a steep moraine, anavalanche overwhelmed the party, killing three. The ParkService Report described the leaders as "competentmountaineers" and considered the group "well led".

There is one common denominator in theseincidents. They all involved "experienced" to "highlyexperienced" mountaineers. Yet nearly every back countryavalanche report reads the same. "No precautions whatsoeverwere taken". Indeed, incidents involving several people arethe rule, indicating that the most basic precaution intraversing avalanche terrain, that is, crossing one at atime, is also the most frequently ignored (Gallagher, 1967,Williams, 1975, Stethem, 1979). If anyone should know aboutavalanches, it should be mountain-climbers, especiallywinter climbers and ski mountaineers. If they werebeginners, it would be easier to understand, but why the"experienced?" The question "why?" and some thoughts onWhat can be done about it are the subject of thispresentation.

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It is very fashionable in mountaineering circlesto speak of "risk". "Avalanches are one of the risks ofclimbing," is an oft-heard commen t. Admi t ted ly, th is has aromantic, even heroic flair to it, and it is certainly aconvenient way of rlismissing the problem. Risk is, withoutquestion, an integral part of mountaineering. There is arisk of falling, which mountaineers temper with ropes andbelays. Vast sums are spent on specialized apparel tooffset the risks of hypothermia and frostbite. Risks areaccepted, but they are first recognized, evaluated, andlimited. For each person, there is a point at which theproposed activity is no longer worth the risk. Thissequence of recognition, evaluation, and qualifiedacceptance is what appears to be absent, not only in theaccidents cited, but in the vast majority of accidentsreported. Most avalanche accidents, at least thoseinvolving recreational mountaineers and tourers, were not afreely and knowledgeably accepted risk.

Simpson-Housley and Fitzharris (1979) suggestpsychological blocks to perception, blocks technically knownas repression and sensitization. They suggest that"optimism may be displayed by a climber, who may know ofavalanches, but considers them to be unlikely while he isclimbing the mountain". The paper further suggests that therisks associated with an avalanche may be too great for usto knowingly live with, so ". .. rationalization, represssion,and denial are the defense mechanisms employed to avoidanxiety about the hazard."

Simpson-Housley and Fitzharris spoke of climbersknowing of avalanches. Most mountaineers do indeed know"of" avalanches: they can tell you the difference between aslab and loose snow avalanches; perhaps they've seen orexperienced an avalanche; but what do they know "about"avalanches. There's an i~portant difference. We all know"of" nuclear reactors, but what do we know "about" them.

Steve Couche conducted an avalanche awarenesssurvey in the form of a simple eighteen-question examinationof winter back country users in the Mount Hood, Oregon area.The scores were compared with experience level and previoustraining of those surveyed (Couche, 1977). The experiencedconsistently scored higher; those with some formal trainingdid likewise. However, the survey also revealed that:

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1. More than nine out of ten (92.4%) failed the test byscoring less than 70%.2. The average score ws 42%. Three years of experienceraised the average only 6 points; formal training only 12points •.3. The most frequently missed question was: "What cluesmight help in recognizing an avalanche slope?" Only 12%could answer it correctly.4. The failure rate was roughly the same for the question:"Can you name some clues that can help you determine whethera slope is stable or not?"

couche's work seems to indicate that, regardless of trainingand experience, or of what they knew "of" avalanches, veryfew knew how to recognize terrain hazards.

Apparently training programs are deficient andexperience is an unrealiable method of learning. In light ofthis, some important aspects of the teaching and learningprocess, as it relates to avalanche hazard awareness, mustbe considered.

The first concept is that of avalanche "safety".Avalanches are destructive phenomena similar to earthquakes,floods, hurricanes, tornadoes, and rockfalls. Perhaps thisconcept, i.e. paradoxically linking a destructive naturalphenomenon with the word "safety", is one conceptualstumbling block affecting the learning process, or one ofthe defense mechanisms we use to deny the existence ofhazard.

The second concept, one which is extremelyimportant since it deals directly with "learning fromexperience", involves a process referred to here as"negative event feedback". Through negative, non-avalancheevents, erroneous information is acquired which blocks theaccurate perception of hazard. Consider the followingexamples:

Joe Novice spies the clearing on the west side ofAlta Vista in Mount Rainier Park, climbs up and has aglorious time sliding down. No avalanche occurs. Becausenothing happened, a negative avalanche event producesnegative or erroneous feedback. Alta Vista West is recordedas "safe" and will be used as a standard of comparison whenevaluating similar slopes. Alta Vista West is a knownavalanche slope, but generally becomes hazardous only witheast wind loading.

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When Joe Novice makes a tour with Carl Competent,whom he considers an experienced mountaineer, such anegative event takes on still more impetus. Joe followsCarlon a zigazg ascent of Panorama Face. Again nothinghappens, although Panorama Face has, in the past, swept awaymany an unsuspecting climber. Note that even if Carl'sstability evaluation is flawless, his failure to explain hisreasoning prOcess and the potential hazard of the slopeunder other conditions has produced a strong negative eventfeedback in Joe. This situation is very frequent in largeparties: the tenth person in line rarely has any idea ofwhy decisions are being made.

Joe's negative event feedback will be furtherreinforced when he later checks the route they took againstthe descriptions in the climber's guide. "Sure enough,that's the route." Guidebooks are one of the lessobvious sources of negative event feedback. By failing tomention a hazard, a negative action, the reader is subtly,but erroneously led to believe there is no hazard. Magazinearticles and photographs are a variation of the guidebooktheme. The currently popular, mass circulation adventureand skiing magazines often depict enticing scenes of"experts" cavorting in extreme avalanche terrain.

There are many sources of such negative eventfeedback and mountaineers who also downhill ski aresubjected to the most misleading kind. For example, tiredof closure signs put up by patrolmen,Pete Powderhoundtakes up back country skiing and discovers Nirvana. "Overbehind Mount Thunder is a bowl that looks exactly like GreenValley at Crystal Mountain. And up north, there's thishidden spot that reminds me of Scott's Chute." Pete has noidea of how many bombs have been set off in Green Valley, orthat skiers have been buried in Scott's Chute. Pete isloaded with negative event feedback of the worst kind.Each ski area run is a remembered joy, not even remotelyassociated with avalanche hazard. Those involved inhelicopter ski guiding must regularly contend with thissituation.

Through the mechanism of negative event feedback,it is conceivable that "experience" may actually reduce aperson's awareness of avalanche hazard. Worse yet, becausehe has entered the ranks of the "experienced", he begins topass on his incorrect data to others who accept itunquestioningly.

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Perhaps it is time to re-evaluate the content ofour educational efforts. Are we wasting lecture time withmeaningless distinctions between kinds of avalanches, andesoteric discussions of snow crystal types? When we leave alecture, are we sure that everyone in attendance will beable to recognize an avalanche path?

The following is a brief list of suggestedtraining priorities:

1. The objective of "first contact" training programsshould be avalanche path recognition. Avalanches run wherethey have run in the past. And indeed avalanche accidentstend to occur in places where they have occurred in thepast. If a person does decide to cross a known avalancheslope and a non-event ensures, the lack of an avalanche isnow correctly attributed to conditions rather than theterrain.2. Specifically describe how negative event feedback canproduce perceptual blocks to hazard recognition and discussthe origins of negative event feedback.3. Emphasize that the only way to be safe is to avoidhazard; to avoid hazard we must recognize it; and if we areto recognize hazard, we must constantly be looking for it.Rod Newcomb put it very succinctly: "Think about snowstability 100% of the time. I am constantly looking for anysign of instability--If, for an instant my thoughts begin towander, that may be the moment the avalanche outsmarts me".

References

Couche, S. 1977. An Avalanche Survey of Winter BackCountry Users in the Mount Hood Area, Mazama, Vol. 59, No.13. Augmented by personal communication.

Gallagher, D. 1967. The Snowy Torrents, AvalancheAccidents in the United States, 1910-1966. USDA ForestService, Fort Collins, CO.

Simpson-Housley, P. and Fitzharris, B.B. 1979. Perceptionof the Avalanche Hazard. Snow Avalanches, A Review withSpecial Reference to New Zealand, New Zealand MountainSafety Council, Wellington. Also in the New Zealand AlpineJournal 1977, under the title, Individual Appreciation ofAvalanche Danger.

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Stethem, C. and Schaerer, P. 1979. Avalanche Accidents inCanada, 1. A Selection of Case Histories of Accidents, 1955to 1976. National Research Council, Ottawa, publicationNRCC 17292.

Williams, K. 1975. The Snowy Torrents, Avalanchethe United States, 1967-71. USDA Forest Service,Co., Report RM-8.

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Discussion

LaChapelle:-I could not be happier to hear your comments about

what people really need to know. People coming to avalanchecourses should hear about route finding, which is a reallyimportant point.

Your war stories were organized climbs that werescheduled in advance. I would like to suggest that tours areplanned assuming safe conditions will exist at the scheduledtime. If nature has something else in store then one mustbe willing to re-schedule. Many accidents could have beenavoided by changing plans.

Roch:

I disagree because of the difficulties inrecognizing avalanche slopes. Every slope of 30° is boundto avalanche. If you don't want to take any risk, then youhad better stay horne.

Smutek:

That is true. Perhaps one of the things thatpeople need to be impressed with is the extent of avalancheterrain in the mountains.

McClung:

I agree with Andre Roch's comment. People doaccept risks in the mountains and they know they areaccepting the risks. If you looked at the number of peoplein this audience who have been buried in avalanches, I wouldwager that you would find that they are the mostknowledgeable people around and that they have incurredthese burials because they have accepted the risk.

Smutek:

If you look at this audience, you are looking at avery select population. There are some 20,000 or 30,000active climbers in the United States and only a small·fraction of them is here.

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Of the 30,000 climbers, there are about 1,000 highrisk climbers. These tend to be well educated in terms ofhazard and hazard recognition. That leaves another 29,000of what I call low risk mountaineers, and my comments wereabout that group. Risk is part of climbing and the questionis: are risks taken knowledgeably or are risks takenblindly? There are certain patterns that lead me to believethat a large number of climbers are not taking themknowingly.

Some people took my suggestion that recognition ofterrain hazards be the first level of training to mean a"don't go there" thing. On the contrary, I would never tellanybody that, nor would I tell them to go somewhere. I amnot going to tell you what level of risk is acceptable toyou. All I suggest is that a person who recognizes theterrain will change his thoughts.

Fesler:

I think that many climbers are not really aware ofwhat risks they are taking becauie they do not have a clearunderstanding of what physical processes are at play. Whencrossing a particular path, they do not recognize the clues,and they do not have a system for making a decision.

Stethem:

I would like to come back to the subject ofterrain. It is obvious to a climber trying to scale amountain that there is a hazard. In looking at avalancheaccidents it seems to me that many of the people involvedare casual recreationists and the slopes ae not necessarilybig ones. I think people who are teaching courses shouldput more emphasis on terrain evaluation of small,inconspicuous slopes which tend to catch more recreationiststhan the huge, obvious ones.

Cronmiller:

Beside recognizing safe terrain, we should teachpeople that they are usually the trigger of avalanches inunsafe terrain.