Boulder Mountain's Turbo Bowl in Revelstoke, B.C. is shown in this RCMP handout photo, which was taken hours after an avalanche struck on Saturday, March 13, 2010.
Photograph by: Handout/RCMP,
When a wall of snow as fast and powerful as a freight train comes barrelling down a mountainside, the only chance for people in its path is to kick and fight and hope that they can stay above the tumbling debris.
“You have to swim and fight and try and let as much snow pass you as possible,” said Greg Johnson, an avalanche forecaster with the Canadian Avalanche Association in Revelstoke, B.C. “But it’s also just a matter of luck if you can stay upright and with an air pocket.”
Johnson said if at all possible, as a victim is being tossed down the slope, they want to try to end up with their hand near their face so they can clear a space for their nose and mouth.
That is exactly what Jean Nelson did nearly a decade ago after she was buried alive in an avalanche in Battle Abbey, B.C., not too far from where rescuers were frantically searching Sunday for survivors of a massive slide that killed at least two people.
The experienced backcountry skier from Clearwater, in the B.C. Interior, said she and six others triggered an avalanche that tossed them down the mountainside “like corks in the ocean.”
Nelson used her arms to swim as hard as she could before the rumbling slide came to an abrupt stop and she was encased in the snow.
“The first thought that goes through your head is: Was everybody out there buried and is more snow coming?” she said.
Nelson, who was wearing a homing beacon, said she could not move, but she was lucky enough to come to a halt with her hand by her mouth and an air pocket to breathe.
Johnson said there is a lot of air in the snow, but if a victim is not rescued quickly, their breath melts the snow around their face and forms an “ice lens,” which prevents air from reaching the person. They then asphyxiate.
In Nelson’s case, she was lucky that two of her companions ended up free of the snow, so she was found in two or three minutes.
All of the members of her ski group were quickly found alive, but Nelson said the experience changes you.
“You never feel the same in the mountains again,” she said.
Avalanches have been described as “raging rivers,” sweeping everything in their path at speeds as high as 200 kilometres an hour.
The Canadian Avalanche Centre says that from 1978 to 2007, an average of 11 avalanche fatalities occurred each year in Canada.
Eighteen Canadians were killed in the 2007-08 winter. The worst year was 2002-03, when 29 Canadians died.
With files from Vancouver Province
© Copyright (c) Canwest News Service
Boulder Mountain's Turbo Bowl in Revelstoke, B.C. is shown in this RCMP handout photo, which was taken hours after an avalanche struck on Saturday, March 13, 2010.
Photograph by: Handout/RCMP,
When a wall of snow as fast and powerful as a freight train comes barrelling down a mountainside, the only chance for people in its path is to kick and fight and hope that they can stay above the tumbling debris.
“You have to swim and fight and try and let as much snow pass you as possible,” said Greg Johnson, an avalanche forecaster with the Canadian Avalanche Association in Revelstoke, B.C. “But it’s also just a matter of luck if you can stay upright and with an air pocket.”
Johnson said if at all possible, as a victim is being tossed down the slope, they want to try to end up with their hand near their face so they can clear a space for their nose and mouth.
That is exactly what Jean Nelson did nearly a decade ago after she was buried alive in an avalanche in Battle Abbey, B.C., not too far from where rescuers were frantically searching Sunday for survivors of a massive slide that killed at least two people.
The experienced backcountry skier from Clearwater, in the B.C. Interior, said she and six others triggered an avalanche that tossed them down the mountainside “like corks in the ocean.”
Nelson used her arms to swim as hard as she could before the rumbling slide came to an abrupt stop and she was encased in the snow.
“The first thought that goes through your head is: Was everybody out there buried and is more snow coming?” she said.
Nelson, who was wearing a homing beacon, said she could not move, but she was lucky enough to come to a halt with her hand by her mouth and an air pocket to breathe.
Johnson said there is a lot of air in the snow, but if a victim is not rescued quickly, their breath melts the snow around their face and forms an “ice lens,” which prevents air from reaching the person. They then asphyxiate.
In Nelson’s case, she was lucky that two of her companions ended up free of the snow, so she was found in two or three minutes.
All of the members of her ski group were quickly found alive, but Nelson said the experience changes you.
“You never feel the same in the mountains again,” she said.
Avalanches have been described as “raging rivers,” sweeping everything in their path at speeds as high as 200 kilometres an hour.
The Canadian Avalanche Centre says that from 1978 to 2007, an average of 11 avalanche fatalities occurred each year in Canada.
Eighteen Canadians were killed in the 2007-08 winter. The worst year was 2002-03, when 29 Canadians died.
With files from Vancouver Province
Komentar ini telah dihapus oleh administrator blog.
BalasHapus