How to keep safe when winter hiking?

[Paul B]

It’s a nice adventure if you hiking in winter. The tranquility of the great outdoors, the beauty of the scenery, and the feeling of the fresh air in your lungs will bring you to heaven. Avalanches might not be the first thing on your mind whilst you’re out enjoying a snowshoe tour in the mountains, but avalanche safety is an important part of traveling in this terrain.

Here are some basics to keep an eye out for when you’re in winter hiking.

Cornices

These are ledges or shelves of snow that form when wind deposits snow on the downwind (or lee) side of ridges. Cornices can become very large and are potentially dangerous whether they’re above you or below your feet. Standing on a cornice is very dangerous and it can be hard to tell from looking at the snow under your snowshoes. As part of avalanche safety, care should be taken to stay back from the lee sides of ridges while snowshoeing.

Convex Rolls

Convex parts of the slope can be trigger points for avalanches. These ‘rollover’ sections of slopes can also be dangerous whether you’re above or below them. While snowshoeing, choosing paths that avoid these convex rolls is the safest option.

Terrain Traps

A terrain trap is any feature that can worsen the consequences of an avalanche. They might include creeks, ditches, gullies, and cliffs, as well as flat areas under steep slopes and trees or rocks in their slide path. Being aware of terrain traps around you while you’re snowshoeing can help you to avoid dangerous avalanche terrain and remain safe.

Avalanche Paths

If you can see avalanche paths, it’s a sign that you’re in avalanche terrain, so take safety precautions while snowshoeing. In treed areas, avalanche paths are swathes of the forest with no trees, or where the trees are broken. In alpine terrain, avalanche paths are identified by slope shape and steepness.

Weather

Certain types of weather can also make avalanches more likely. If there has been 11.8 inches or more of snow over the past 48 hours, or if the snow has been falling at 0.8 inches per hour for several hours, the avalanche danger will be increased. Wind can also make conditions more dangerous by pressing snow into hard slabs on the downwind side of ridges and high features.

Avalanche danger also increases when warming happens; strong sunshine, warm temperatures, and rain all destabilize the snowpack and can make avalanches more likely. Sometimes, those gloriously sunny days are the perfect time to explore the valley bottoms and more mellow slopes.

Also, it is not enough to avoid the danger of avalanches. The most basic thing to pay attention to when winter hiking is to keep warm. Not only to keep the body warm but also to keep the head and hands warm. To keep your head warm, you can rely on wearing a warm hat, and to keep your hands warm, you can bring an Ocoopa Union 5S rechargeable hand warmer which can heat for 15 hours constantly to ensure you a whole day’s warmth.

All in all, hope you pay attention to safety, protect yourself, and have a pleasant winter hiking!

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