Paul Hooge Guest Blog 
It’s a big powder day and the whole town is out, heading for their favorite stash- hoping to get first tracks. Personally, I like the North Face of Mt. Crested Butte and when the patrol drops the rope, I avoid the open terrain and head for the terraced terrain with open glades. My goal is to reduce the risk of being caught in a big slide in-bounds. Between Dec. 31st, 2006 and Jan.1st and 2nd of 2007, it snowed 8 feet in Mt. CB and, it was days before the extremes were certified as “safeâ€. Today, I skied down hard slab under the rocks and cut down through ‘Rachels’ heading for the glades below. The area has a lot of variety and is less likely to slide, so I entered ‘Rachels’ in a traverse with confidence – oops. It was one of those personally and quietly stated, â€Oh, shit†moments, when you realize the ground beneath you just moved as the snow settled about a foot. It’s almost always the same; you wait silently and without even thinking you evaluate your situation, looking for a way to ski out if the snow slides. Fortunately, the low pitch of this slope helped to arrest the unstable snow leaving a fault line about ten feet long, but no slide. Risky business living in snow country, especially at the higher elevations where a long history of avalanches began, just about as soon as the first Europeans arrived, hoping to strike it rich in the mountains. The Alpine Tunnel (11,523’) was built in 1881 to facilitate migration and minerals. The small town of Woodstock was founded on the steep slopes below the tunnel. The former town of 200 is all about archaeology now, after having been destroyed by a massive avalanche on March 10, 1884. The disaster left 18 buried and 13 dead, including Marcella Doyle’s six children. Avalanches are equal opportunity killers and all you have to do is be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Every year people trigger slides while on snowshoes, skis, snowmobiles, snow-cats and snowboards. Even cars and trains have triggered slides. A roof slide can destroy an automobile, let alone a human. Speaking of the “wrong place scenario,†a condo development in CB was built at the bottom of a steep slope that had a 35° pitch and about 400 feet of vertical. The complex was hit several times resulting in one death before slide mitigation was installed. Crested Butte’s avalanche problems are not unique by any means, and are similar to every other mountain town with high elevation and deep snow pack. Avalanche tragedies touch just about everyone in ski country, and we personally have lost friends. As recently as December of 2008, a friend named Mike Bowen went back-country boarding along the northeast flank of Mt. Emmons and died in a slide. Mike was not wearing his avalanche beacon and was, perhaps, overconfident, having been involved in snow sports in the area for years. Back country ski deaths are not unusual, but in-bounds avalanche fatalities have, until the 07/08 season, been rare. Last year, eight skiers died just off resort property at several areas in the mountain West and in British Columbia; however, it is the increasing frequency of slides in-bounds that is causing alarm. Mitchell Schott discussed this problem in the November issue of “Powder Magazineâ€, noting that there were many close calls in 07/08, including two deaths – one at the Canyons, Utah and another at Big White in B.C. Even extensive bombing and other standard mitigation techniques haven’t kept avalanches at bay, which was the case at Blackcomb Glacier on January 6, 2008. Avalanche deaths totaled 52 for the 2007/2008 season, the 2nd highest on record.
Come back for Part 2 of this blog, tomorrow