 Poster: A snowHead
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| galpinos wrote: |
| davidof wrote: |
| https://www.outsideonline.com/2329041/chamonix-zermatt-alps-haute-route-disaster |
Pretty incredible story. I'm surprised at the number of mentions of people navigating by phone. I have never liked the idea of using the battery of my only device I can use to call for help as my main navigational tool as well. It seems to have little redundancy. Also, space blankets! Bivy or bothy bags have long been the staples, blankets are little use in the mildest of breezes. |
I survived an unintended overnight in a blizzard which came in earlier than forecast in the Highlands one Feb quite easily. Simple old skool orange plastic bivvy bag with corner cut for air. Dug a bench in the lee of a boulder. 4 pack or Mars Bars for fuel/ morale. Actually was lovely walking out at dawn.
Helped I was in good plastic mountain boots.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Terrible tragedy. So easy to criticize with hindsight.
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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| DB wrote: |
I still don't get this nationality difference thing. Other nationalities learn from guides too, look at all the courses the Alpenverein, DAV, SAC & CAI etc run.
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That rather highlights the difference. The alpine clubs have formal programs, for example you generally can't sign up for tours without doing a safety course. The leaders are trained to high standards not incomparable to MIA or MIC in the UK, those qualifications are often part of the UIAA training platforms. That doesn't really exist in the UK where clubs don't really operate like that with notable exceptions like some good university clubs.
The commercial side is different, far more travel or recreationally based. It's probably such a difference precisely because the alpine clubs do what they do.
The UK is different, there is the CC, AC, ABMSAC, eagles etc but mostly people act as individuals and sign up with trips.
As a consequence, a guide led European group is different in outlook to a UK one.
There's still some cultural norming there, this is just more common with Brits but it's not universal. Americans are somewhat different again IME.
Brits do lose out by not having access to the alpine club training though. There are moves to standardise some of the avalanche rescue protocols and communication of them which should benefit Brits in particular IMO
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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I'm fairly aware of the courses that MTUK run, I've completed the mountain leader summer course myself 
https://www.baiml.org/baiml/directors/#ianspare
https://www.uimla.org/executive
I'm well aware of the UK sections of alpine clubs, I did already mention ABMSAC of course. These are pretty small scale, IIRC DAV has about 170k members in total with around 30k in the Munich area alone. In the UK you've got around 51k members of the BMC with around 24k in affiliated clubs. They're not offering the amount of training that the other alpine clubs, or UIAA members, do but there's no common model. BMC have run a lot of good training as well, I've delivered an outdoor first course for the BMC myself in fact.
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| Whitegold wrote: |
The guide was amateur-hour.
Not checking the weather. Not enough battery. Not enough phones. Not enough GPS. Not enough backup devices. Not roping up. Not enough food and drink. Not enough shelter.
Dood was a disaster. |
Really, he's climbed three 8000'ers and set up a guiding business in the 90's running many trips. A lot of customers and other guides praised him saying he was normally very careful. One of the group survivors had been on numerous trips with him before (Lisa).
Have you ever led a group in thick fog and wind above 2000m altitude? - I have, it aint easy even with map, compass, phone with navi app & Garmin outdoor GPS with detailed maps of the area. On another ocassion I've had to deal with someone who started showing signs of hypothermia and became dis-orientated at altitude. It's easy to fire off quip comments from behind the internet in the comfort of your armchair but until you have experienced fog, high winds, exhaustion, early stages of hypothermia, dis-orientation and getting lost at high altitude it's all just an uneducated opinion.
He did check the weather. I don't know if if he forgot to charge the phone, often in the mountain huts there are two sockets and 100 people waiting to charge their phones. The press speculated a lot of things e.g. he didn't have a GPS etc but did the police ever confirm this?
Even Reinhold Messner commented on this tradegy and said in a sudden complete whiteout you are up sh'ts creek without a paddle.
http://www.alpin.de/home/news/23932/artikel_bergdrama_im_wallis_ermittlungen_entlasten_bergfuehrer.html
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| DB wrote: |
He did check the weather. I don't know if if he forgot to charge the phone, often in the mountain huts there are two sockets and 100 people waiting to charge their phones. The press speculated he didn't have a GPS etc but did the police ever confirm this?
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They will, it's the general protocol after an incident to establish the professional is properly equipped. This would typically take the format of producing a photo or video inventory of the gear at the time of the incident. It's often normal to do a breath test as well. In any following investigation, it reduces uncertainty. There are checks by the PGHM who'll give guidance on what should be carried and it's covered in professional development (to varying degrees currently). That's reflective practice of course and based on the understanding of incidents.
The normal, current, expectation is that a professional has some means of communication. That would require satphones or radios in most places. Having a flat battery is no more acceptable in them than it would be for a transceiver. Everything gets lighter, there's just more of it to carry. Personally, I have a couple of smartphones, a flip phone that lasts forever and a satphone (which is a pain going through security at the airport).
A lot of huts are installing charging stations now and will find somewhere for a guide to charge their phone if asked. Power generally is less of an issue than it used to be. For modern or refurbished huts, solar panels and battery are way better than they were.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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@ise,
Was a police report published, if so what did it say?
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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Over the years I've kind of grown to obsess about the weather, even for everyday stuff. Long story.
But for a high altitude mountain stuff you would have thought it would be essential. And with something like the HR were there are plenty of other parties a weather event like this shouldn't come as a surprise.
It's a sad tale. TBH no point in carrying the discussion on too long. It's clear the mistakes that were made and unless someone can communicate with the dead we're not going to know why they were made.
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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Into next week, for the next four / five weeks I'm going to be spending time with a guide mate who is now getting back his fitness levels after an accident last May in preparation for the coming season, with a fair bit of cycling (as he said he needs to be pushed) and then hiking / climbing where he'll get his own back.
I'll try and bring this tragic story up into conversation as I'm sure he like most guides will be aware (they have access to various locked websites / forums) as to the horrendous events.
But in the past when there have been big accidents and loss of life involving guides I find that he and others are not willing to open up.....
So if asking the obvious question "Well what have you done if you'd been there" I would probably be met with some philosophical response along the lines of "I wasn't so how would I know".
And any further interrogation the answers would be equally evasive, for sure other guides might be different?
I've only ever once been in a similar situation and we simply turned back and retraced our route, then it was heavy snow and zero viz and no wind, but it's the violent winds that can take a manageable situation and turn it into a catastrophic one.
Also when in Japan ski touring this year up Mount Yoti in one of the three days of the year the sun shines I asked the guide what happens should there be an incident as no heli can normally fly, and he had a substantial amount of gear that I suspect European guides might not carry?
Another awkward question maybe to ask?
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| DB wrote: |
| ... until you have experienced fog, high winds, exhaustion, early stages of hypothermia, dis-orientation and getting lost at high altitude it's all just an uneducated opinion.... |
Perhaps we should all compare our CVs so we can decide who has the most experience?
Then we would not need opinions at all, instead just deferring to the one with the most experience 
| Italian Guiding Association wrote: |
The group was perfectly equipped for the itinerary from the point of view of the equipment,
the Mountain Guide had with it all the necessary devices for safety, GPS, satellite phone and smartphone with Swiss map. |
The eye-witness reports do not tally with that on multiple points.
A flat satellite phone battery makes that accessory a brick, for example.
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I wonder what their standard protocol is. Do they publish it? I'd expect no single points of failure, for example.
It looks like an attitude problem, exacerbated by lack or failure of formal protocols.
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You know it makes sense.
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| philwig wrote: |
| DB wrote: |
| ... until you have experienced fog, high winds, exhaustion, early stages of hypothermia, dis-orientation and getting lost at high altitude it's all just an uneducated opinion.... |
Perhaps we should all compare our CVs so we can decide who has the most experience?
Then we would not need opinions at all, instead just deferring to the one with the most experience |
I missed that earlier, as a point of interest, hypothermia doesn't really have a standard presentation. It's quite hard to identify where being cold becomes hypothermia and in reality (my experience) when things go bad, they go bad very quickly and the casualty goes into shock fast. Much the same can be said of hyperthermia as it happens.
| philwig wrote: |
| Italian Guiding Association wrote: |
The group was perfectly equipped for the itinerary from the point of view of the equipment,
the Mountain Guide had with it all the necessary devices for safety, GPS, satellite phone and smartphone with Swiss map. |
The eye-witness reports do not tally with that on multiple points.
A flat satellite phone battery makes that accessory a brick, for example.
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I wonder what their standard protocol is. Do they publish it? I'd expect no single points of failure, for example.
It looks like an attitude problem, exacerbated by lack or failure of formal protocols. |
There are protocols, there could be more and they could be better published (edit, in my personal opinion). If there are safety protocols then it seems to me that in safety conscious environments they ought to be known so that we can verify compliance and increase confidence. For example, you already see some commercial operators requiring contractors to carry satphones and making it part of their tender response for work. Generally, there's no "one size, fits all" - what's appropriate will vary and a major task in any incident review is to identify what the expectation is for that scenario. That may appear to be less fixed than you expect but it's the very definition of an expert that they take these decisions.
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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Poster: A snowHead
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| ise wrote: |
| I missed that earlier, as a point of interest, hypothermia doesn't really have a standard presentation. It's quite hard to identify where being cold becomes hypothermia and in reality (my experience) when things go bad, they go bad very quickly and the casualty goes into shock fast. Much the same can be said of hyperthermia as it happens. |
At the time I didn't know what was going on, we weren't all that high (approx 2000m) it was winter but not that cold (approx minus 5). One girl in the group started to act strangely as though she had been drinking/smoking something. In a matter of minutes she was falling over on easy terrain and didn't respond to simple requests. We made a bee line for a nearby winter room to warm her up but the door was frozen shut with ice. We also gave her all the extra clothing we could. I decided the best thing was to get her off the mountain ASAP cutting the tour short and taking the quickest route down. It was difficult as we had to escort her down by telling her to hold onto the back of my rucksack but she would just let go and wonder off. Exhaustion and altitude does funny things to the mind, it's possible the HR group had all the right equipment (Bivybags etc) and know how on how to build a snow shelter but did not have the capability to use it as their minds had gone cuckoo.
From the long interview translation on page 1 ….
| Tommaso Pìccioli wrote: |
| Look... as far as I can remember, there was suitable ground for digging a trune*, all around where we stopped and where we stayed. We could have walked only ten metres away and dug a trune. Yet none of us, not even Mario, said, or went there to dig a trune. |
*trune = snow cave as far as I can tell
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/truna#Italian
More info.
http://hauteroute2017.weebly.com/blog/day-5-april-5th-2017-cabane-des-dix-to-cabane-des-vignettes
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Remember that without a smartphone or GPS you'd be more likely to stay put in the hut and wait out the weather and without Tommaso's GPS they may have hunkered down or turned back much earlier rather than spending hours trying to find a route to a hut they could see was only a few hundred meters away. It's that big risk homeostasis thing again.
@DB - and the French non-guided group did survive in a snow cave. Despite their obvious navigation problems perhaps that was the difference between a small, cohesive group and a large, heterogeneous guide lead group.
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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| davidof wrote: |
| @DB - and the French non-guided group did survive in a snow cave. Despite their obvious navigation problems perhaps that was the difference between a small, cohesive group and a large, heterogeneous guide lead group. |
I'm with you on the small cohesive group. The guided group may have all been at the same fairly experienced level but they weren't a team. The french survived because they worked as a team and built a snow cave, the others probably survived because they were fitter and so could stop themselves from falling asleep (big respect to the 72 year old).
For such a trip with people who have not all toured together before it would be better to do a days avi training and snowcave building beforehand. This would build the team and work out the individual strengths of the group.
The people with whom I am planning to do some 4000'ers with will be out with the snow shoes, avi training and digging snow caves as soon as there is enough snow to do so.
Last edited by Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see? on Wed 3-10-18 16:01; edited 3 times in total
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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correct, you have to be careful with some of these terms but that's correct. I happened to read it in an assessment report recently and I had to check.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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I think that is as tragic a story as I have read.
I guess the their are lots of people who post on here who are involved in professions where 'human factors' are very often involved in bad outcomes.
I'd guess that this was the case here.
Storm -Haut Route - Group - Stuck in Deep Muddy - Expert Halo- Stopped on rocky ground- More stuck thinking (?hypothermia)- Night fall-Snow blindness
You wonder if there might have been other distractions somewhere, guide stressed or preoccupied, some critical errors with packing / gear checks etc
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@Tristero, well done for coming back with that, and the SRF have turned on captions. Thank-you.
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That's a good video, and gave more information.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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Amazing and sad how close to the hut they were.
I am always amazed how disorientating bad vis is - even in the places you think you know well.
I can imagine how it emotional it was for those survivors going back.
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Caused me to not finish some rather needed work around the house. Glued to the screen for an hour and half instead. 
Reminds me of the 1996 Everest tragedy. When guides failed, their trusting clients died with them.
One interesting mystery, no mentioning of what the police found on what happened to the guide’s full electronics gadgets. They all “failed to work”. But was it hardware, which would be rather a huge coincidence. Or was it because the guide was snow blind and couldn’t see well enough to operate them?
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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The to-ing and fro-ing in the various comments has been good to read. There are some recollections of previous places and incidents which have helped me to reflect. I am reminded of the brilliant last sections of Joe Simpson’s book … where he analyses the deep cause of why he broke his leg on Suila Grande - and carefully, element by element he gets to the cause - they didn’t take enough gas. So they were rushing. And thus making compromised moves and judgements.
That has always stayed with me. Look for the deep cause (there may be more than one). So….in another incident a friend of mine had a terrible fall in poor vis whilst skiing, which left him with life changing injuries. We looked for the deep cause. And we found it. The wrong goggles. He couldn’t really see properly to avoid the terrain trap.
One of the most important things about improvement in the safety of the aviation industry is the accident analysis and reporting system. Which in identifying deep cause in the Tenerife accident highlighted poor cockpit culture and errors in professional progression in KLM.
I’d like to fully understand the deep cause(s) in this accident here. OO has identified ‘suspension of judgement due to deference to professional’ - which is a highly likely cause here given the size and mix of the group. I have only ever been genuinely lost once. Reason…I relied on a friend navigating and didn’t check every way point and triangulation myself, using compass and map. He was using electronics and I relied on that. And so the problem developed without me realising it. And then we were both in trouble.
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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| ise wrote: |
| davidof wrote: |
| DB wrote: |
| Whoever is leading the group at least one other should be nominated to take the lead in the event something happens, this person should also be involved in the planning. |
the guide's wife was an experienced IML, I guess she had the role of a second although she also perished in the accident. |
It's fairly unrealistic to expect a group member to be capable of taking a lead. It's also pretty tough to get people to take extra load like safety gear.
As an example, last week I found a French guy wandering around a section of the GR20 on Corsica who was lost. He had a perfectly good map, phone etc but when I saw him the first time he was was unaware of which side of a ridge he was - i.e. couldn't read the contours or the spot heights well enough to figure out he'd not climbed the 800m extra to pass the ridge. When I next saw him three hours later he was walking the wrong way along a trail with the assistance of a passing group of around 6-8 people who were well-equipped but entirely unaware of where they were. That was quite appalling navigation, they were crossing a distinctive terrain feature (the Ravin de Paglia Orba) and had overshot the required junction by around 1.2km. That junction was extremely sketchy and not signed but again was around 50m from a distinctive terrain feature (a 90º turn on a path at a stream following a 700m descent). This was on a clear sunny day admittedly on the GR20 which is not trivial but people generally hire guides in terrain they're not comfortable in. I wouldn't assume clients can micro nav in complex terrain
Standards and best practice move on, I've moved on from carrying an emergency shelter to having several small ones to spread around a group. I've a satellite phone which is the normal expectation for a professional in that sort of environment (or radio), I may buy another to give to clients.
My guess is he'd have rocked up at the next refuge who would have put him straight, in the event he figured his best option was to tag along with me and my wife who he assumed was paying  |
Route finding is pretty easy on the GR20 - there are red and white way markers all the way! Compare to the wilds of Scotland. Or indeed navigating on trackless snow with poor viz at altitude.
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| DB wrote: |
@davidof,
Yes a GPS is only accurate to around 10m and 10m off the side of a cliff is 10.3 m too far. As I've probably used up my chances/cat lives I find it even better to learn from other people's mistakes in the mountains.
I wonder what was going through the guides mind. He was probably under pressure to deliver the goods for his customers. Did the weather forecast change shortly before the trip leaving him unprepared for a suitable alternative? Did he think it was better just to turn up at the hut in a storm rather than book in advance? If the hut had refused in the morning what would he have done? Did he just underestimate the risk as it was a highly frequented route? As with car accidents isn't there a higher occurrence rate near to home when people become too familar?
Nowadays when you lead a ski tour almost everyone in the group with a mobile phone has an educated opinion, until you all lose reception.
With or without a guide a single point of failure is never good. A falling rock, a slip, an unexpected avalanche or equipment failure leading to injury can take a guide out. Whoever is leading the group at least one other should be nominated to take the lead in the event something happens, this person should also be involved in the planning. |
ON the GPS / mobile phone thing, I have seldom used GPS in the mountains, generally relying on map, compass (and occasionally altimeter in the alps). But the last couple of years I have used my phone too. I found that if I download the map (I was using fatmaps) to the phone then I can switch off data and the GPS signal is very reliable. I don't understand why losing reception is an issue?
I also tend to take screen grabs of highly zoomed in views of trick nav sections. I find that really helps pick out buttresses and things. These just sit in my photo library alongside snap shots of pages from guide books etc.
I have also bought an inreach mini. It is a great little gadget and really reassuring. Just used it for a few days ski touring in Feb but knowing your way points are being uploaded to the cloud and be accessed in an instant by rescuers if you hit the emergency button is a good feeling. Even if I hope I'll never need to use it!
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You know it makes sense.
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sorry - realise that this is a resurrected thread and I'm replying to old posts. ill watch the vid though!
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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| valais2 wrote: |
| [Simpson was] rushing. And thus making compromised moves and judgement |
Mmm. It's a while since I read the book, but from what I recall Simpson could have been injured for any reason at all, not just rushing, and the situation would have been identical. That suggests that his problem was lack of a contingency plan for getting injured, not precisely how he actually got injured. Going slower will address the risk of going too fast, but does nothing for every other way he could get injured.
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House's guided group completed the exact same traverse in the same conditions without incident. He planned for the obvious risk by reconnoitring the route a few hours before, and obtaining a complete and up to date GPS track. I still think he took a fair risk there, but we don't know what contingency plans he may have had because his actions ensured that he didn't need them.
The French group was using map and compass according to the video but got lost very early, as did Mario. Their maps were subsequently blown away and unreadable in the storm, but they also don't show precisely where the crevasses are either.
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Poster: A snowHead
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@phil_w, I knew someone who climbed with Joe S around Yorkshire - and while you are right, he was a walking accident-about-to-happen apparently - ‘very gung ho’ would be the traditional way of putting it - the reflection in the end of the book is very interesting. It’s helped me over the years - essentially asking ‘what assumptions am I making about this excursion…’….’and what are the pitfalls of making those assumptions…’. Recently I carried a backup headtorch in the Lakes, and then thought about my lack of knowledge of the party I was with, and slipped a second backup in my pack. Boy did we need it when one of the party’s previously blown knee force us to descend in the dark rather than the planned twilight descent.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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| jedster wrote: |
I have also bought an inreach mini. It is a great little gadget and really reassuring. Just used it for a few days ski touring in Feb but knowing your way points are being uploaded to the cloud and be accessed in an instant by rescuers if you hit the emergency button is a good feeling. Even if I hope I'll never need to use it! |
I’ve used inreach for years (still have the big old yellow one)- agree it’s an amazing piece of safety tech. Unlike almost every alternative (satphone, radio, flares etc) if left in tracking mode it requires no active intervention from the user to be useful. A rescuer can just look at where the last trackpoint was recorded and probably be within 200m. It also provides just enough communication to be useful on a long expedition (weather, short updates from home etc) but not so much that it’s any use for work!
I can envisage the day when it’s integrated with an avalanche beacon, with a higher refresh rate, so that you can get within e.g. 10m of the burial very rapidly.
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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@jedster,
Even with saved maps you can still experience a loss of the GPS system, as happened during the tragedy for some of the time.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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| DB wrote: |
@jedster,
Even with saved maps you can still experience a loss of the GPS system, as happened during the tragedy for some of the time. |
Didn’t know that. What causes it? Problems with a satellite or two?
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| DB wrote: |
@jedster,
Even with saved maps you can still experience a loss of the GPS system, as happened during the tragedy for some of the time. |
Although that’s to an extent mitigated these days as many devices get position from more than one global satellite positioning system, of which GPS is just one.
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| jedster wrote: |
| DB wrote: |
@jedster,
Even with saved maps you can still experience a loss of the GPS system, as happened during the tragedy for some of the time. |
Didn’t know that. What causes it? Problems with a satellite or two? |
Sometimes the phone navigation app can cause problems (useful to have at least 2 navigation apps and make sure they are updated).
The terrain can cause problems e.g. in steep terrain cars are offen sent the wrong way.
In mountainous terrain sometimes satellites can be lost and a minimum number of sats‘ are required to give an accurate position. GPS reception can also be lost through obstacles (thick woods / trees).
Although weather doesn’t normally affect GPS‘s water can.
I once updated the GPS software on my phone and the settings were changed. The rotation of the map (between traveling direction and north) was swapped which confused the hell out of me. I wonder if this was what threw the guide off course.
Last edited by Then you can post your own questions or snow reports... on Thu 4-05-23 7:50; edited 1 time in total
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That’s a really exposed spot they were caught out in - finding the entry point round the corner to the Vignettes is not straightforward even in good weather - and if the weather came in faster than expected and maybe they were slower on the route than planned (assume they were descending from Pigne d’Arolla at 3700m which would have been an exhausting climb). That combined with equipment malfunction would be a nasty trifecta of bad luck. We got caught out with bad weather coming in faster than expected on Mont Blanc many years back and only the guides GPS saved us from a very bad situation.
Re relying on guide, I was cave diving with an (old, rather tubby) guide recently and made a mental note of the route, thinking if he has a heart attack in here we will need to find our own way out or it’s certain death!
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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@BobinCH, …that’s exactly right…I’ve been above Arolla when the Foehn is coming in - it’s a particularly brutal zone and I caught frost nip despite moving fast and in otherwise good conditions.
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FAQ
