I suppose we can all imagine a freak accident where a ballet dancer is performing some great feat and slips and falls and breaks their neck ….. such a tragedy ……. they die from their injury …… Well this is not that story!!!! This is a story about how humans can balance risk and …… well you will see.
First some background ……. Anyone that has lived in the Rocky Mountains of Canada knows that avalanches are serious business …… they are dangerous and kill people every year. Rogers Pass is a mountain pass in the Rockies and part of the Trans Canada Highway just east of Revelstoke British Columbia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rogers_Pass_(British_Columbia) . The summit of the pass is at approximately 1,350 meters or 4,400 feet above sea level. Rogers Pass receives an average of close to 31 feet of snow per year and most of that arrives in 4 months …. December through March ….. Bottom line ….. It gets lots of snow almost every day!!!!
I had the opportunity to live at Rogers Pass https://www.pc.gc.ca/en/lhn-nhs/bc/rogers for two winter seasons in 2007-08 and in 2009-10. It is one of the most dramatically beautiful places I have ever seen …… and as always ….. There are always two sides to every story …… the avalanche danger there is extreme …… Parks Canada (my employer) looked after 50 kilometers of the Trans Canada Highway in the park …… within those 50 kms, there are 27 active avalanche chutes ….. you can read that last part as “DANGER”.
The beautiful scenery has a very dark side in that our Canadian winters create dangers of all sorts. Rogers Pass, being one of the snowiest places in Canada, is a major problem to road ….. Highway #1, the Trans Canada Highway ….. and the railroad …… The Canadian Pacific Railroad https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1910_Rogers_Pass_avalanche . These are both primary transportation modalities in Canada. Whether it be a traffic accident, slippery roads or an avalanche, if the roads close it is a big problem. I heard one story that said that a closure of the highway cost near $1 million per day and a railroad closure $6 million per day in economic impact ….. Whatever the number it is serious business. A detour means hundreds of kilometers in extra travel by road ….. There are no other railroads!! This article provides a little more scope to the challenges that area faced …. https://www.canadianconsultingengineer.com/features/avalanche-detection-at-rogers-pass/
The normal cause of trouble at Rogers Pass, as you might expect, are slippery roads that lead to minor accidents like cars off the road or semi-trucks jack-knifed and blocking the road ….. Sometimes for a few minutes or a couple of hours …. These minor delays happen almost daily …..
The avalanche danger is a whole other level of concern because …… well have a look at the image below …… it takes forever to move a mountain of snow like the one shown here ….. So there is a whole lot of effort that goes into preventing avalanches
Avalanche Canada https://www.avalanche.ca/ has the responsibility of assessing the threat of avalanches across the whole region. Like weather forecasting, their work is part science but there is a large part that is art https://www.avalanche.ca/forecasts/kootenay-boundary ….. the weather forecast is directly related to the avalanche forecast!! Once it is clear that there is avalanche danger then there is a whole process that begins in trying to prevent those avalanches from endangering the public ….. back country skiers …. The railroad …… the highway ….. And of course any other threat to life and limb.
Since 1961 the Canadian Armed Forces has been the backbone of avalanche control in Rogers Pass. Each winter “Operation Palaci” sends a contingent of soldiers from CFB Camp Shilo Manitoba https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CFB_Shilo to stay at Rogers Pass where they use 105mm howitzers to shoot down the snow masses that pose an avalanche threat to the highway and railroad in the park..
In recent years the Army has been complemented with private helicopter contractors using timed explosives. https://www.lrhelicopters.com/avalanche-control-2/ This is much more accurate and much more expensive.
New technological tools are also being used to help forecasting using different sensors throughout the park these systems “detect(s) avalanches in all conditions—in the middle of a storm, at night, when visibility is reduced to nothing,” explains Alan Jones, P.Eng., principal with Dynamic Avalanche Consultants, based in Revelstoke, B.C. “Forecasters have a limited ability to know when to close the highway. The goal is to increase their confidence and improve the efficiency of closures.”
They are all attempting to release a snowpack before it threatens the railroad and the highway but …… as the following video suggests …… you see the avalanche, then you see the highway and railroad in the valley below …… and it sure looks like their effort covered the roads.
So you probably get the picture …… you don’t want to be caught in an avalanche ….. There are many recorded experiences of people riding the wave of an avalanche and escaping but it is not something the average person should count on!!
OK!! So much for the backgrounder ….. Back to the real story ….. And this is all true …. LOL
My friend Aaron and I were on shift one afternoon late in the season (maybe mid March). It was a beautiful sunny day ….. Temperatures were warming up ….. between minus 5 – and plus 5 degrees Celsius ….. Perfect for slippery, icy roads but also …… as temperatures change, snow crystals change and ….. Voila …… avalanche conditions become a serious concern.
Our job of course was not plowing snow ….. The job when the weather is good is to patrol the road looking
for anything out of the ordinary ….. Most of the time things are totally ordinary! ….. You can read that last part as “there isn’t much going on or another boring day on the job”.
So we are patrolling in a Parks Canada four wheel drive pick up when we come across a BMW MINI up on a snowbank https://cars.usnews.com/cars-trucks/mini/cooper/2010
Hard to say what happened exactly but we figured he probably hit an ice patch ….. Lost control of the car and up he went. We pull over to help ….. Turn on our orange flashing lights to warn oncoming traffic and here is the driver sitting in his car ….. Trying to get a cell phone signal and call for help ….. ( I will call our driver Gustav – I can’t really remember his name)
Well ….. As you might imagine there are many spots in the mountains where there are cell phone dead zones and wouldn’t you know it …… this was one of those. You might also have guessed that just next to Gustav’s car was a highway sign ….. “No Stopping – Avalanche Zone”.
Part of our job is to help the travelling public and so we begin to explain to Gustav that we are happy to help him and that we will take him to the summit where he can get a cell signal and call for a tow truck. Gustav refuses our help and is adamant that he does not want to leave his car alone in this wilderness ….. OK Gustav ….. maybe you don’t quite get it!
We try ….. using our best “Customer Service” words possible to convince Gustav that ….. that he is in serious avalanche danger here …… “Listen Gustav ….. Do you have auto insurance? …… well if there was an avalanche and anything happens to your car, your insurance will cover you!!!” …….. There probably will not be an avalanche but …… your “very cute little Mini” would most likely be OK …… But Gustav think …….. if there is an avalanche here YOU WILL DIE …… we even got Gustav to talk to our supervisor on our two-way radio to confirm that there was serious danger and he should come with us.
Gustav was so torn ….. For some reason he just could not bring himself to leave his precious Mini and come with us to safety! ….. and of course, where he could actually call a tow truck and get his Mini out of the snow bank.
Finally ….. We stated clearly to Gustav that we were leaving and that he had to choose. “Take whatever valuables out of the car that you want and bring them with you if you like!!!”
“OK! OK! …. Just give me a minute!” So Gustav climbs the snow bank to his Mini …. Scrounges around in the back seat ….. It felt more like an hour than a minute to us …… and …..
Here is the good part ….. Gustav pulls out a pair of shoes ….
Being kinda like mountain men, Aaron and I just looked at each other and smirked to ourselves (remember Customer Service)
We just could not comprehend that we had endured this whole drama over a pair of shoes.
Turns out that they were expensive ballet shoes and that Gustav was a ballet dancer!!!!
So there you have it ….. The dangers of avalanches …… we saved a pair of dancing shoes ….. And a good laugh was had by us mountain men!!!!
No one died this time!!!! ….. But really now ….. Those avalanche signs are for real!!!! DO NOT STOP IN AVALANCHE ZONES …. even in the summer months!!!!!
