Your Chances of Surviving Being Buried in an Avalanche
More Articles Related to SafetyWinter survival includes understanding avalanche dangers. Many survival enthusiasts travel in mountainous country during times when the threat of avalanches is an ever present danger.
Fortunately for us there are a number of organizations that specialize in avalanche study and avalanche safety, and they make their knowledge available to the public.
According to the US Forest Service National Avalanche Center, last year's avalanche victims included:
- 5 climbers
- 25 backcountry skiers
- 4 backcountry snowboarders
- 23 snowmobilers
- 1 hiker or snowshoer
The state of Colorado has its share of skiers, snowboarders, snowmobilers, and winter climbers. So it is no surprise to find Colorado has an agency that is at the forefront of avalanche safety and research.
A picture is worth a thousand words and these two interesting charts provided by the state of Colorado are certainly worth taking a look at (click image for full-size view). This sobering information should be enough to caused people who go into the backcountry when there is deep snow to take notice.
The first avalanche chart is titled "Percent Survival vs Burial Time". As you can see, if an avalanche victim is not rescued within ten or fifteen minutes their chances of surviving being buried in the avalanche drop very quickly. During the first 15-minutes you have about a 90% chance of survival. Being buried in an avalanche for just twice that long lowers your odds to only about 30%.
The second chart of interest gives us information on avalanche victim’s chances of survival according to their depth of burial. Here again the line of death drops quickly. Being buried in an avalanche to a depth of just one foot gives you a 75% chance, but add just one more foot of snow on top of you and your odds decrease to just 50%! If you are more than 7 feet below the surface of the avalanche you have pretty much had it.
For more information on avalanche safety visit the state of Colorado Avalanche Information Center website.
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