Woah. What an intersection of cultures... a GQ article, on avalanche rescue, posted on HN. I'm excited to read the conversation. There are many problems/inconsi

Woah. What an intersection of cultures... a GQ article, on avalanche rescue, posted on HN. I'm excited to read the conversation. There are many problems/inconsistencies/vagueries in the article that make little sense. It seems the author doesn't have much expertise in avalanches and didn't have an expert consult on the final (interesting-ish) piece. I wonder why this particular incident was chosen, as it's fairly uninteresting as far as backcountry rescues go. I also wonder why a publication like GQ doesn't have an expert write these articles... First, "his two friends followed at a safe distance, a few dozen yards behind". Anyone who has taken an avy safety course should know that that is anything but safe. The friends should have never been in the couloir with him, there should have been someone scoping line of sight [1]. This is such a key point because, although these mountain services are doing god's work in terms of keeping people safe, your friends are by far your most important (and often only) rescue support. The article highlights this with them standing dumbfounded at the crown of the avalanche, and their friend nearly paid with their life. Second, wind slabs aren't inherently unsafe just because there is "new snow stacked on old snow" although they statistically frequently lead to unsafe conditions. The safety of snow conditions is about the layers in the snowpack and what is in between them, is there a surface for this wind slab to slide on? The author misses a great opportunity to briefly educate readers (and themselves) on the details of avalanche safety here. Third, for those of you interested in this type of thing the Colorado information center does field reports on avalanches and burials and keeps an absolute wealth of data on hand on as many of the parameters as possible [2]. I have some ideas for some analyses using these data that could provide insight into avalanche conditions and variability but never have the time. Avalanche research is very very underfunded. And finally, if anyone is looking for a great book on the mechanics of avalanches (i.e. engineering mechanics), check out "Avalanche Dynamics" by Pudasaini [3]. It's by far the best text covering the literature on the internal aspects of avalanches. It has all the good makings of really difficult/interesting science, statics, fluids, dynamics, inhomogeneity, a dearth of data, real world complexity, relative lack of importance to the survival of the human species... [1] https://www.jonessnowboards.com/content/362-how-to-descend-in-avalanche-terrain-on-a-splitboard https://www.jonessnowboards.com/content/362-how-to-descend-i... [2] https://www.avalanche.state.co.us/observations/field-reports/ https://www.avalanche.state.co.us/observations/field-reports... [3] https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-540-32687-8 https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-540-32687-8 Postscript: This is such a GQ fucking article, complete with useless paragraphs of fluffy flowery language that lean towards a mediocre impersonation of Hunter S. Thompson. Love it.