The Avalanche Hour Podcast

In this episode, host Sean Zimmerman-Wall sits down with Emilie Drinkwater. Emilie is an AMGA/IFMGA Mountain Guide based in Salt Lake City, Utah but born and raised in New Hampshire. She guides year round, instructs pro and recreational avalanche courses for the American Avalanche Institute, and is a member of the AMGA Instructor Team. Emilie has a great curiosity for remote mountains around the world and has traveled, climbed, and skied in such notable locations as Alaska, Afghanistan, and India. If it were up to her, Iran, Iraq, and North Korea would be next on the list. Until then, she’ll continue enjoying the abundant backyard adventures to be found in the Wasatch and beyond. Music by Ketsa Support for this episode provided by: Wyssen Avalanche Control Gordini Propagation Labs

Caleb starts out this episode catching up with Jayne Thompson-Nolan, the Executive Director of the American Avalanche Association. She lets us know about some updates and initiatives of the A3. Katie Warren drops in to chat about some of her experiences working as a Steven’s Pass Patroller, helping out with highway avalanche mitigation along Highway 2, and a transition of scale to regional backcountry forecasting for NWAC. Thanks to the sponsors of the show: Wyssen Avalanche Control Gordini 6 Point Engineering Beacon Guidebooks Music by Gravy www.americanavalancheassociation.org www.nwac.us www.evergreentrailruns.com

Caleb sits down with Jon Ferrian. Jon loves to snowmobile. He has been riding his whole life and has a strong passion for spreading the word about backcountry safety amongst a greater audience on his live-streamed podcast, Live Large Universe. Jon talks about the progression in his own backcountry avalanche awareness and how he has seen a shift in the motorized culture to a place where being avy-savvy is cool! Jon created the Live Large University Scholarship program in partnership with AIARE to make avalanche education more accessible to riders. He chats with us about what the Avalanche Alliance is, and how the money from the Avalanche Alliance Sweepstakes is making a difference for all user groups through the support of avalanche forecast centers. Music by Gravy @gravy.tunes Buy your tickets to the Avalanche Alliance Sweepstakes by December 10,2023: https://www.tapkat.org/american-institute-for-avalanche-research-education/Wk1eqk?promo=LIVELARGE Avalanche Alliance: https://www.avalanche-alliance.org/ Live Large Universe: https://www.facebook.com/search/top?q=jon%20ferrian%20live

Whether we are celebrating, processing, or grieving an event in the mountains, many of us reach for a drink to help us along the way. Alcohol is steeped in our culture as a whole, but can become especially amplified in ski and mountain culture. What happens when it gets out of control for some of us? In today’s episode, several of your hosts from the podcast share their stories of how they came to give up alcohol in recent years. Wes, Sean, and Caleb are joined by Jake Hutchinson to give their perspectives on their relationship with alcohol. Laura McGladrey sat in on the conversation and added some reflective perspective towards the end of the chat. The hope of this episode is not meant to shame or preach, but simply to share our stories and reflect on how alcohol has impacted our careers and personal lives. We hope that this episode will help someone out there who may be struggling with some of the same issues we have faced. Websites: Alcoholics Anonymous: https://www.aa.org/ Responder Alliance: www.responderalliance.com Warriors healing network: https://warriorshealingnetwork.org/ Redside Foundation: https://www.redsidefoundation.org/ Mountain Muskox: https://www.mountainmuskox.com/ Funding: American Avalanche Association Resiliency Fund: https://www.americanavalancheassociation.org/a3-resilience-grant Climbing Grief Fund: https://americanalpineclub.org/grieffund Literature: https://thisnakedmind.com/ https://www.aa.org/the-big-book Music in this episode is provided by Gravy with the track Shabbadoobah from the album Mountains, Valleys, Places Between. You can find his tracks at gravytunes.bandcamp.com. Artwork by Mike Tea, miketea.com Episode produced by Wes Gregg

Known as the ‘Godfather Of Freeskiing’, Mike Douglas is consistently listed by media outlets as one of the most influential skiers of all time. He began his career as a mogul skier on the Canadian Freestyle Ski Team in the early 1990s. In 1997, he developed the first high-performance twin-tip ski, the Salomon Teneighty, and his freeskiing career was launched. Dubbed the New Canadian Air Force, Mike and his crew of Canadians revolutionized the sport with their tricks at ski resorts across the globe. He even has a signature tick - the D Spin. Mike has appeared in more than 50 ski films, was named Powder Magazine’s ‘Male Skier Of The Year’ in 2003, and was the voice of skiing at the X Games for 14 years. In 2004, Mike founded Switchback Entertainment - a video production company specializing in outdoor adventure films and commercials. He launched the groundbreaking web series, Salomon TV, in 2007 and has produced/directed more than a dozen award-winning films including The Freedom Chair, Tempting Fear, Eclipse, Snowman, Guilt Trip and Fountain Of Youth. From 1997-2017 his role as a marketing consultant and ambassador for Whistler Blackcomb helped propel the organization to the top of the ski resort rankings. He has been named ‘Favourite Whistlerite’ 7 times by the readers of Whistler’s local newspaper, Pique Newsmagazine. Today, Mike is a married father of two, and splits his time between raising his family, skiing professionally, producing/directing films and commercials at Switchback Entertainment, and environmental advocacy work. He is the former Board Chair for Protect Our Winters Canada - an environmental group focused on fighting climate change. He is also on the Board of Directors for the Whistler Blackcomb Foundation. You can find him on social media at: Instagram: @mikedski Twitter: @mikedski Facebook.com/mikedouglas Music for this episode by Gravy @gravy.tunes www.switchbackentertainment.com Sam and Me – Overcoming Climate Anxiety https://youtu.be/itPEPpiMojc?si=E5pLii2ZitxllkDW www.protectourwinters.ca www.protectourwinters.org www.wyssenavalanche.com www.gordini.com www.sixpointeng.com

In this episode, Caleb sits down with Rob Coppolillo. Rob is an IFMGA guide, avalanche educator, and author of The Ski Guide Manual (among other titles). Rob talks about his progression to become a pinned mountain guide, tips his hat to some folks who influenced him along the way, and chats about living and ski guiding in Europe. We discuss some ideas on effective avalanche education as well as what went into writing his books. Rob reflects on a couple close ones....and then reflects on reflecting (debriefing!). We hope you enjoy! Music on today's episode is Ketsa: "40 something" and "Anvil" Thanks to the sponsors of today's episode: Wyssen Avalanche Control Gordini Propagation Labs

Part 2 of Caleb Merril and Dom Baker’s conversation with Eirik Sharp – the President of the Canadian Avalanche Association (CAA). In part 2 Eirik shares his experiences from a diverse career in almost every corner of the avalanche world. From ski patrol to research, ski guiding to avalanche forecasting in remote places – Eirik has tales to tell and thoughtful reflections to learn from. Dig in to this gem of a conversation. Eirik is a long-time avalanche professional based in Whitehorse, Yukon. Originally from Norway, he grew up skiing backcountry and has worked in the snow for 18 years as a researcher, forecaster, educator, consultant, and ACMG ski guide. He has an M.Sc. in GIS with research focused on applications of machine learning to avalanche mapping. He currently works on the Alpine Solutions Avalanche Services engineering team, specializing in terrain modelling and avalanche risk assessment. However, he still gets out into the field to support industrial operational avalanche risk management programs as much as he can through the winter. Eirik is passionate about supporting, promoting, and elevating professional avalanche practice in Canada; he worked for ten years as an instructor with the Canadian Avalanche Association’s industry training program and has served as President of the CAA since 2022. Music for this episode by Gravy @gravy.tunes Episode produced by Wes Gregg at Trigger Backcountry Adventures www.avalancheassociation.ca www.wyssenavalanche.com www.gordini.com www.beaconguidebooks.com

Caleb Merril and Dom Baker are joined by Eirik Sharp – the President of the Canadian Avalanche Association (CAA). CAA is the professional organization that ensures a high standard of practice for avalanche workers in Canada. The CAA Industry Training Program is registered private post-secondary training institution that provides the professional level avalanche training for avalanche practitioners in Canada. The CAA also provides the information sharing system for avalanche operations in Canada and beyond – InfoEX. In part one Eirik talks about the CAA history, membership structure, avalanche education and the unique challenges of being a software provider. CAA members may work in any number of different facets of the snow and avalanche world, from guiding to education, patrolling to avalanche forecasting, and for operations such as ski resorts, heli, cat or ski touring operations and industrial or transportation settings such as mines, pipelines, highways or railway. This broad set of avalanche practitioners are united by a common training stream, a daily information exchange, and a common standard of practice. In large part this has all been coordinated by the Canadian Avalanche Association Eirik is a long-time avalanche professional based in Whitehorse, Yukon. Originally from Norway, he grew up skiing backcountry and has worked in the snow for 18 years as a researcher, forecaster, educator, consultant, and ACMG ski guide. He has an M.Sc. in GIS with research focused on applications of machine learning to avalanche mapping. He currently works on the Alpine Solutions Avalanche Services engineering team, specializing in terrain modelling and avalanche risk assessment. However, he still gets out into the field to support industrial operational avalanche risk management programs as much as he can through the winter. Eirik is passionate about supporting, promoting, and elevating professional avalanche practice in Canada; he worked for ten years as an instructor with the Canadian Avalanche Association’s industry training program and has served as President of the CAA since 2022. Music for this episode by Gravy @gravy.tunes Episode produced by Wes Gregg at Trigger Backcountry Adventures www.avalancheassociation.ca www.wyssenavalanche.com www.gordini.com www.beaconguidebooks.com

In this episode, Dr. Sara Boilen sits down with Caleb to discuss the broad topic of human factors. We explore the concept that acknowledgment and awareness of our human factors (the perception of our situation and environment, cognitive biases, and heuristic traps) may not be enough. While the concept is embraced within our community, perhaps we lack the tools and framework to deal with them as they will ultimately arise in all backcountry adventures. Sara provides some tools to start this work for yourself and amongst your touring partners. She was fresh back from presenting at the Wyoming Snow and Avalanche Workshop and reflected on some presentations that hit home for her. Music by Gravy. Dr. Sara Boilen is a clinical and forensic psychologist and the owner of Sweetgrass Psychological Services in Northwest Montana. She earned her doctorate from the University of Denver where she researched the impact of rock climbing on women’s sense of hope and courage. She founded Sweetgrass Psychological Services ten years ago to meet the growing need for accessible and affordable mental healthcare in Montana. She later founded Well Montana, a nonprofit aimed at meeting all Montanans wherever they are in their mental wellness journey. She is the board chair of SheJumps and in her free time engages in research, theory development, and education for the avalanche community that she holds dear. She spends her days alternating between testifying in forensic cases, supervising bright trainees in her clinic, providing therapy to clients, and tromping up mountains typically with some sort of dessert in her bag. She lives with her partner and their dog, Klaus, outside of Whitefish, MT. The Monkey Business Illusion: https://youtu.be/IGQmdoK_ZfY?si=GjADdF8qSBsyDUkN "Your gonna be glad I brought two cookies" recipe: https://www.bonappetit.com/recipe/salted-butter-and-chocolate-chunk-shortbread Sara's favorite chocolate cake recipe: https://smittenkitchen.com/2015/02/the-i-want-chocolate-cake-cake/ Sara's Human Factor MadLibs: https://static1.squarespace.com/static/58daf985e3df28fd7e577a10/t/6539b5d58835e52841e6839d/1698280920164/Mad+Libs.png WYSAW recording: COMING SOON!

Today's episode features Peter Bilous. Peter is a yankee who resides in Wanaka, New Zealand. He has spent 70-plus seasons playing and working in the snow. He has ski tour and heli-ski guided all across the globe throughout his career and has had a big hand in professional avalanche education in New Zealand. Peter is the Avalanche and Snowsports program manager at Otago Polytechnic where about 90% of New Zealand's Pro courses take place. We chat about what has gone into the development and progression of the program. Peter recounts a close call in an avalanche and some of the contributing weather, snowpack, and human factors that played a role. Finally, he talks about some of the accomplishments of his two sons in the Freeride World Tour and Olympics! We hope you enjoy! Music by Ketsa: "Turn it on" and "Plus 9" Otago Polytechnic Avalanche Safety Program: https://www.op.ac.nz/study/avalanche-safety/ ISSW Proceeding Archive by Year: https://arc.lib.montana.edu/snow-science/workshops.php Thank you to Wyssen Avalanche Control and 6 Point Engineering for their support for this episode.