Reflecting on the past winter I have to say it has been some of the most challenging few months of my life, but mixed in with the exhaustion and stress is an undeniable sense of excitement thanks to the Avalanche Science Program. I spent two years studying engineering, physics, and astrophysics at CU Boulder before leaving because I couldn’t afford it and have been trying to figure out where to go from there. I moved to Vail, CO and very quickly realized my greatest passion was climbing mountains and winter backcountry travel, but also quickly realized how unprepared I was to do this safely. While taking basic avalanche education courses through AIARE, I learned about CMC’s Avalanche Science program and it appeared to be something I would be very interested in. Although little more than a year has passed since I applied to the program and have completed my first year in the program, I now feel like I am following my true passion and in the process of turning it into my career. Though it has been a great challenge to keep up with school while working more than a full time job, sitting in bushes outside of the library at 10 at night in the middle of winter to use their wifi, calibrating my snow thermometers and drawing out my snow pit graphs in random restaurants and bars, maintain all of my split-boarding gear and snow study equipment I have loved every late night spent studying the physics of snow and every cold field mission spent digging and traveling through snow.

Coming into this program I thought of myself, as most young avid backcountry recreationalists think, as a bit of a backcountry and avalanche expert already, even though I had only had a couple years of backcountry experience. More than anything, this first year in the Avalanche Science Program has taught me how much I don’t know, and how far I have to go before I can think of calling myself an expert.

What I have learned throughout these courses in the span of just one year not only redefined how I am going to approach snow science, avalanche safety, and backcountry travel but the general way with how I interpret data and continually gain more valuable knowledge to organize and improve all aspects of my life. On the backcountry safety and snow science side of things I have become very interested and already learned more than I thought possible in the general structure of the snowpack, it’s metamorphic processes throughout different grain types and vapor pressure gradients, and the atmospheric conditions certain kinds of ice crystals are made in. I did not know how much weather observations and forecasting had to do with avalanche science until this year either. I have seen myself go from glancing at Accuweather on my phone to see what the weather was going to do, to creating my own detailed weather forecast using the Snellman forecast funnel to get an idea of hemispheric, synoptic, and mesoscale weather phenomena and how it will affect the current state of the snowpack I am interested in. I am learning that there is no answer on how to solve an avalanche problem but rather using all the data collection and knowledge you can, from the snowpack, from others observations, from historical data, from weather conditions, etc... in combination to come up with a general sense of where and why the snow is the most unstable. With this scientific and factual based approach to Avalanche Science I have found myself excelling(though I recognize I have a very long way to go), perhaps because I have a little bit of background in physics or perhaps it is because I find it so interesting. On the other side of backcountry safety and the part of this program that likely has changed my outlook on most things in life is the human factors side of traveling through avalanche terrain. To try to keep it simple and not write 10 pages on my opinions about human factors in avalanche terrain I can try to bullet point some of the more relevant information that I have been trying to apply more regularly and I believe can be extremely beneficial in a backcountry setting or in an everyday life setting. The importance of trip planning beforehand, making runlists and setting hard boundaries for yourself and your group before heading into the field is debatably the most powerful tool you have in your toolbelt to stay alive in avalanche terrain. Along with the importance of trip planning is all the resources I have learned about through this program from understanding the weather to mapping softwares and how to read and mark maps to your advantage (Caltopo and Google Earth!!!Thanks for that presentation John).

After the different professions and careers I have had a chance to get a little more insight into I have a feeling will enjoy and thrive best as an avalanche forecaster. I would certainly like to try to intern with a forecasting operation. Maybe a highway forecaster, backcountry, or as a private forecaster but I have been thinking it would be nice to try to get outside of CO and get some real experience with a different snowpack, perhaps Utah or Wyoming!

I’m not sure I can quite express how excited I am to continue on with the Avalanche Science Program and even more excited to see where it takes me. I truly believe this program is something special and has the capabilities of changing the entire snow and avalanche industry for the better.