A Slightly Tongue in Cheek Guide to Snow

Snow science seems to be in vogue and nothing wrong with that. But - most folk are not avalanche forecasters just Joe average trying to make good decisions. I like to simplify it when discussing so here’s a white board session based on a  picture taken on an avy course I ran some time ago when the PowerPoint projector failed and I had to cuff it. A good whiteboard session is good as an instructor as you need to know your subject and cant hide behind pictures:

Mountaineers are seldom "searchable"
Above "The Gate"  below Summit Gully Glencoe
Spot Probe Finds x 2 Fatal 😢

• The avalanche forecast is an area forecast. The local risk may be different + or –

• Read the forecast and its nuances, snow pack history and snow profile – and the blog. They have done 80% of the work for you. You decide the rest

• Terrain choice is a big deal, Angle, Aspect and Altitude, Complexity, Commitment and Consequences

• Water becomes ice or something along a continuum

• Snow flakes have branches which break up if transported by the wind

• More wind more break up, denser snow pack i.e Slab

• Graupel is not hail which is a laminate, but it is a ball of softish ice. Graupel are ball bearings with similar effects with new snow laying on top. They eddy into rock features causing local weakness. Rocks can be Islands of safety or a landmine.

• The deeper you go down the snow pack the less cold it gets until at ground level its zero or just above. Mice shrews and invertebrates live there. 

• Water vapour rises through the snowpack.

• Crystals can grow/regrow in cold conditions either on the surface as hoar or within the snowpack as hoar/crystal regrowth.

• Early season shallow snowpacks can be just as lethal as big deep snowpacks as water vapour causes surface hoar which if snowed on become lethal, graupel can be trapped around prominent rocks causing trigger points, or crystal re growth/faceting can occur and get buried. Shallow is just as lethal as deep.

• Avalanche forecasters measure the snow temperature every 10cm. If the temperature is greater than 1c in 10cm going up the snowpack then the snowpack is getting weaker. Less than 1c in 10cm then overtime the snow pack will eventually get stronger, Strong gradients grow facets, weak gradients make rounds.

• In rain, thaw and warmer weather crystals round off sometimes joining to each other

• Wet snow is Water logged snow and can flow like a concrete river down gullies, corries and obvious slide paths. Beware spring thaws or after heavy rain.

• Wind blown slab snow shears or collapses on a layer underneath and just like rice crispie's there's a snap, crackle and pop

• Whump is the sound of air escape from under the slab, the snap.  If it doesn’t pop go buy a lottery ticket as your lucks in.

• Windslab most often requires a trigger. You are the trigger and in the poop!

• Snow pits should be kept simple. The SAIS and other forecasting services in alpine countries do the heavy lifting. Snow pits and profiles are only relevant for the couple of  square meters where you dig. They are good places to take stock, talk and communicate. The data might confirm what you see but also might not. Its just a hole in the snow. The armpit test is fast and repeatable but not definitive. Dig out a small hole and above cut out as deep a column as you can with a ski end, pole or shovel. Pull on it to see if the surface slab is bonded to the underlying snow pack.

• The progression of survival probability such as % survival at a given time is a statistic. You could survive a couple of hours if in the miracle headline survivor group, but more likely dead from hypoxia unless companions dig you out fast. Bear in mind ski patrollers who can get to fully buried victims in alpine resorts fast, give BLS with fast helicopter access and ALS from dedicated SAR Docs taking the victims to specialist centre's and even then victims do not survive to discharge. Your companions are your saviours.

• A shovel is an airway opening device

• If you are not searchable your fucked 

• That's about it really

The Long Road Home. Quite a Tale!

Angus "Angie" Gunn my Father

My father as well as many local men from North Argyll and Oban fought with the Argylls and the Norfolks of the 51st Highland Division at the rear guard action of St Valery which sacrificed thousands of men, partly so that Dunkirk was a success. They fought on hard against Rommel's troops for many days after Dunkirk was over and done with before surrender 12th June. This sacrifice was not acknowledged until 50 years later. Possibly because it was contentious and an embarrassment to Churchill. The privations of "the long walk" both to the salt mines and logging camps in Silesia, then escaping the Russians back west at the wars end cost many Highlanders lives.

Audio Interview With the Three Escapee's  https://youtu.be/pEk-B5JQhBM

Information on the Sty Valery Surrender and its lead up  https://51hd.co.uk/history/valery_1940

The three men in this story showed remarkable initiative and this story is worthy of any Hollywood movie.  As a wee boy I remember "the blood" telling the tale at a Glencoe Village Hall Celeidh and also my Dad and "Ginger" talking about the war up at the Elliots Cottage where we would go at New Year. From what I gathered in conversation I don't think it was as easy as this understated interview leads you to suspect. And of course things occurred that are best not in print. It was war after all.

The Black Crow and Feeding the Rat

As we pass the summer solstice I get introspective and undoubtedly feel a change as I am sure we all do. West Highland life is essentially a bit bipolar and can make for a dark season of the soul unless we continue to seek light outside, or inwardly lift ourselves.

I can tell when it's changing for me as bad dreams occasionally come back with restless muggy nights.  A few are mountain related. The randomness of climbing near misses such as a piss poor belay ripping out with 16 stone hanging at the other end and someone holding us both on by the hood of my jacket. Working in the wood and  a one ton skyline carriage skiffs past my head as it falls from the sky, or my work mate killed next to me when 150ft of Sitka swings his way and not mine, these all seem random bad luck compared to actual choices in the mountains like the poor belay on offer as no choice, that still gives me the shivers as I visualize flying out over Aonach Dubh. 

Climbing mountains has soul and becomes your church and tribe and risk acceptance part of that compensates for adventures heavy price. We all have a Pandora's box and occasionally the lid lifts a bit and this reflective stuff gets out before we jump back on top of it again. The claustrophobia and fear of burial in winter is a recurring one for me when I have a chesty cough or cold that makes breathing hard at night. Hay fever the recent trigger. Youtube and other places where you see avalanche recoveries cannot convey the pressure on your chest and sheer terror of not being able to shift air. No one is unchanged after being buried. Hayfever is an unusual trigger I guess. 

Bracken ticks and midgies and soft evening light. Very Highland

Seasonal melancholia can be mistaken for mental illness. Which of course it can be. Having downers is pretty normal living here. Its all down to Latitude and dare I say by dropping the "L" how we approach it. We have to hunker down and see it through. 

We have just had an exceptional spell of dry sunny weather to top up morale and body batteries. Mood is high for a but. Surfing that positive wave with good friends and activities is the way through the troughs to come. Or as I am now considering, moving to where there is more sun. But the West when it delivers is so special and delivers big so it might be Appin not Spain! 

If not West maybe East or central like Aberfeldy or Callander. Who knows but the positivity of the sun and good company sure helps with moods. I would certainly miss my friend many of whom are new to the area but have been steadfast during a difficult year. 

Feeding the adventure rat gnawing away inside is also a good way to help. I started soloing about a bit recently and went a bit old school leaving the phone and not telling anyone to spice it up old school style. I have quickly realised that I don't have the mental resources for this anymore with too many people to live for and love and to miss if it all goes wrong. I'm no longer prepared to pay the heavier price for adventure and so I will stick to well protected trad and clipping. And hugging and beer.

Edinburgh midsummer from Gilmerton. Nice!

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Road Trip with the Lads

Road trips are a big part of climbing culture. I certainly did plenty with Fiona as I was lucky to have a climbing and life partner all in one. Lads trips fuelled by beer and bravado were also great fun. Most relatively straightforward. Drive, climb, beer, repeat. Some were mini epics even before the drive though. 

We were only about 3 years married. I had an old banger Ford Escort with no MOT or handbrake for taking firewood from the Forest above our house where I was clear felling. I had filled it with logs at the bottom of what we knew as "The Tarry Brae". Unusually it was a steep section of forest road that had tar laid on it. I filled the car up with logs, went over the top and the bugger just stopped and started slowly rolling back. I thought I had time to get the brick under a back wheel but it skewed out and I was left hanging off the open boot full of logs and slipped off the the side as the car went back stopping itself on a big butt at the side of the road. Pretty grazed up and shaken I got back in and after several try's got the car going again and gunned it over the top and back down a gentler but longer way back.  Arriving back I dumped the old car at the house and Fiona told me George Reid had been on the phone. Paul Rodgers and Paul Moores both Joint Services Mountain Training Instructors were going down to North Wales for three days did I want to come so we had two ropes of two. I ok'd it with Fiona, and they agreed to come down and collect me about 7 o'clock that night, but we needed to go down via an up to Fort George. 

Climbers Club Hut Llanberis

We arrived in Inverness about 9pm, found a bar and Paul went off to Fort George for something.  We got picked back up about 11pm and headed South at mach1 in Pauls RS Cosworth arriving late at a  railway bridge near Penrith where we could get under and sleep. I kept rolling off down into a fence where rail tracks were and every half an hour a goods train rumbled past. Not the best of sleeps. Early morning we head South with a visit to the  Great Orme Pen Trwyn and climbs left of Parisellas Cave where sport climbing had recently started. Short brutal hard climbs and a Jerry Moffat playground. Llandudno is a sort of Welsh Blackpool with not much to commend itself to climbers but plenty if your old. 

Wrecked fingers later and off to Llanberis and the Pass. It had been five years since my last visit to the pass, where darts with Mo, Joe and Whillans at the Padarn were the evening entertainment. Again we stayed at Ynys Ettws the climber Club hut where there was a meet on including some Fell & Rock folk we new such as Nick Escort. We manged to blag the last available bunks. I was on the top one of a three tier. Down to the "old Vic" for a beer with Mo and Joe which turned out to be several as folk we knew turned up like John Ellis Roberts whom I had met through mountain rescue a few years earlier. Many pints were had. I vaguely remember folk gathered around me in the middle of the night as I got up for a piss forgetting I was 15ft up and crashed onto the floor waking everyone up. I don't know how, but I didn't piss myself!  Anyway, breakfast at Pete's Eats then out to Gogarth for Quartz Icicles, Dreams of White Horses, abseils, drowning potential, sea and sunshine. "Dreams" was regarded as an exciting HVS 4c back then, which technically is about right. However, waves crash over the first pitch if you go low, and if you fall off the last pitch you better have prussiks or your not coming back up. The other option is down into the Zawn and drowning.

A good days climbing was had and we headed out to sunny Caernarfon for beer, fish and chips, and visit to a local climbers pub with rough men, pretty women and trouble brewing. I made the mistake of thinking I could just chat to a girl that came over to speak not realising green eyed monsters were watching. We escaped back to the Llanberis and the old Vic again. Next day was spent in the pass ticking of Brant Direct, Slape Direct and Ribs with Crackstones and Crackstones with Ribs, Eroded Grooves and me flying off a polished Unicorn Direct not knowing it was a sandbag. Many routes later and dehydration so George produces two cans of Macewans Export from his rucksack. We stash gear and put on our packs. He cracks a tinny and takes a good slurp puts the can down and I bend over to get it and a huge rock hits my back and knocks me over. A guy above the crag must have knocked the rock off. You kind of just shrug that shit off. I was more shaken from flying off the shiny polished second pitch of  Unicorn as my hand jams pulled.

Tremendous Book ***

Back down to the car and mach1 northwards through late Sunday night traffic, arriving back in Duror about 1am. A snuggle up to a warm cosy young wife, get up at 7am, collect the Husky chainsaw, fuel cans and stuff and up the wood to cut as many tons of trees as I could. Road trips were fun. Not sure where time has gone as back then we thought we had forever. Now only memories. 

Post Script. 

• John Ellis Roberts died in a climbing accident on Dinas Cromlech July 2014

• Paul Rodgers lost his life in the Cairngorms January 1984 

"Where the mountains touch the sky,

Where poets DREAM, where eagles fly,

A secret place above the crowd,

Just beneath a silver-lined cloud"

Spring, a notional concept

“Spring passes and one remembers one’s innocence.

Summer passes and one remembers one’s exuberance.
Autumn passes and one remembers one’s reverence.
Winter passes and one remembers one’s perseverance.”

Yoko Ono

The Scottish "Spring" has arrived early and as usual it is a very notional concept as we have some winter up high. Snow drops are popping up early, bulbs and daffys are growing and even Glencoe village has the sun threatening to appear after is long holiday below Am Meall.  Glencoe Massacre day on the 13th is when we at the lower end of the village get a blink. Ironic on a day of remembrance of a tragedy.

The best best time in the mountains is approaching with longer days, shorter nights, and you could say better weather (that's a very notional thing). Winter isn't over and has a few throws at us yet though. late Feb/March is a great time to get the touring ski's out, or the free ski's to get exploring. The spring snowpack is often a granular corn and much les avalanche prone too. But as we all know we can end up with big dumps, high winds and full winter conditions right up until May. Don't let you guard drop too early.

I am always banging on about avalanche risk as in a way it's my bread and butter as a Recco trainer and Ortovox retailer, also working with the great folk of Glencoe ski patrol on a mountain that has many interesting slopes. Being a three sided polygon the ski mountain always has an aspect that loads, and two of the aspects give great off piste itineries with the main one the best snow holding in Scotland. Spring snow days with good cover and folk are dropping off into the back and having fun or venturing over to Clachleathad and Creise.

Selling avalanche equipment and teaching avalanche rescue is very satisfying.  The courses I used to run were not really about rescue though, which is a misconception some seem to have. They are about awareness of the weather, causes of avalanches, how to avoid them through planning, thinking about group dynamics and communication, and terrain interpretation. In this context the rescue and recovery scenarios are very much about acknowledging that we get things wrong and bad things happen. If you have not succeeded in avoiding the risk then by practicing with the rescue tools (beacon, shovel, probe) in realistic scenarios you can reduce the consequences. No enough emphasis is given on risk exposure and risk acceptance. Basically off piste skiing you are tugging the tail of a dragon. The more often you tug the more likely that one day it will flame you out. You can dig pits, look at crystals and do all that stuff but keep dropping 32° slopes on new snow days and one day your burnt.

It's dead easy to slip a red ski patrol jacket on, or become an armchair expert and be risk averse. But, most of us have learned more about the subject by our own errors, and most often if you work or play hard in the mountains with risk exposure, sadly with time your number will come up. That's the mountains and specifically when off piste skiing where the line between the best day of your life and the last day can be ephemeral. Unless folk accept that as a basic premise they might as well take up knitting. Skiing the steeps and the deeps can never be made 100% safe by ski patrollers, bombs or fences. It's down to you the skier, ski patroller (or mountaineer) to get out, and get experience away from your familiar areas of recreation or work, so you that you are forced to learn to make plans, decisions and terrain choices in unfamiliar places.  That's where you learn quickest.  You have to do this to stay alive.

There are no shortcuts. Only time in the mountains (a lifetime), respect for them (humility) and learning to read them (terrain) will keep you alive.  Oh! and a defecit of hubris helps.