good choices and close calls

  We all make mistakes, and most have had close calls, but how often do these close calls fly under the radar? In the introduction of his book Staying Alive in Avalanche Terrain, Bruce Tremper states that “snow is stable about 95 percent of the time”. He speaks of the positive reinforcement we receive each time we go out into avalanche terrain without incident when really we may have just gotten lucky. Maybe we didn’t weigh enough, maybe we didn’t ski over the sweet spot that could have let the whole slope go… How many times have we mistaken close calls with good choices?

Screen shot from a video as a slab breaks under a snowboarder in Romania. Image courtesy of onboardmag.com.

  This article by Clark Corey speaks to the subject and offers food for thought about the choices we make in the backcountry.

Enjoy!