Close Call with Travis Rice

The more seasons I get under my belt the more I have an issue with the glorification of avalanches in ski movies. Whether it's purposefully cutting small slabs to sluff the face or just plain playing with dangerous avalanche conditions, it really isn't something we should be taking with a light undertone. Close calls and full blown skier involvements, for the most part, tend to not make the movie or just be shown quickly in the highlight reel with no real discussion.  Personally, I feel that it could give the viewers the false sense that avalanches will happen often and it's just a part of skiing big terrain or skiing in general. When the point really should be driven home that if you accidentally cause an avalanche, you made a mistake and it shouldn't simply be brushed away over a high five . You should reflect on why you or your friends were caught when their pants down. If you choose to share it on Mountain Information Network that's great but a good chat on the way home about what could have been done to mitigate the avalanche problem that day should be a minimum. 

Firing up the old Facebook machine this morning I was really happy to see that Travis Rice had made an edit talking about his near miss in Alaska. Brain farm is certainly one of those movie companies that would leave me shaking my head with the way the portrayed avalanches. If you haven't watched the Fourth Phase the movie ends on a serious note with T Rice being caught but a moderate size avalanche and forcefully dragged through a terrain trap. The whole thing was caught in ultra HD and with great audio. Travis used the images to made an educational video for the avalanche education website Know Before You Go which can be found here www.KBYG.org