Fun with avalanche rescue.

I know I haven't written in a while. This weekend I was up in the mountains for an avalanche rescue training. I'll write a full post soon, but in the meanwhile check out this classic shot of myself with one of the avalanche rescue dogs.


Great animals. They have a program in which they drop these dogs, their handlers, and another avalanche rescue technician into slide zones by helicopter if they suspect people may have been buried. As with any avalanche, recovery is much more common than rescue, but the dogs are very successful and greatly reduce the time and personnel needed to find a buried victim. It's also safer for the rescuers, considering with this method you only need 2 people and a dog on the ground in a potentially dangerous area as opposed to 20-30 or more needed for probe line recoveries.