An average of 22.5 people die in snow avalanche accidents every year in the United States.
Unfortunately, these deaths cannot simply be categorized as tragedies of random chance. Ninety percent of fatal avalanches are triggered by the victim or one of their companions, often while out skiing, snowboarding, or snowmobiling. Additionally, whether triggered by recreationists or by more natural causes such as strong winds, meltwater, or rapidly changing weather, avalanches can rush downhill to dangerously sweep over and block country roads, endangering drivers and local infrastructure.
Preventing Harm™ from avalanches often comes down to the following:
- Identifying high-risk areas for avalanches, including natural and snow-built slopes of 30-45 degrees, with particular attention placed on the lee side of snow-covered mountains
- Monitoring high-risk areas with avalanche detection technology and integrating these systems with automatic text and email warning systems to protect recreationists and nearby drivers
- Carefully triggering controlled release avalanches so as to prevent recreationists from triggering them while out on the slopes
- Educating recreationists on how to connect to warning systems, recognize high-risk terrain, and how to respond if caught in or near an avalanche event
Many backcountry winter sports areas are well established with thorough, documented geographical mapping. Geographical knowledge, insight from avalanche experts, recent weather patterns, and the area's own history of avalanche incidents combine to identify the areas most likely to give rise to avalanche conditions and possible fatalities.
Significant efforts are made to train locals and recreationists on how to coordinate with and respond to the established avalanche monitoring and risk assessment systems, as well as how to use the tactics and tools of avalanche survival.
This places much of the remainder of the avalanche fatality prevention on the sophistication and reliability of avalanche detection technologies.
What is Avalanche Detection and How Does Radar Play a Role?
Avalanches, once triggered, move quickly, accelerating to speeds of up to 80 mph in a matter of seconds, too often engulfing any witnesses before they can help themselves or anyone else.
Avalanches move so quickly that even those who are seemingly safe, hundreds of meters away from an avalanche’s starting point, can be suddenly thrown into danger by the swiftly moving ice. Ice detached from hanging glaciers, for example, can fall down cliffsides hundreds of feet high and onto unsuspecting travelers, roads, or slopes that will carry the snow farther to endanger more people.
For avalanche detection systems to be of any use, they must detect the beginning of the avalanche, the perilous first movements of broken-off snow slabs, early and at a distance. These systems must also be able to send out instant alerts to nearby recreationists and drivers. Finally, these technologies must also, of necessity, function reliably in snowy, foggy, and otherwise visually obscuring weather conditions, including during all nighttime hours. All of these requirements make mid-range radar an ideal means for avalanche detection, as they monitor in real-time, integrate easily with other technologies, and are not hampered by low-light or obscuring conditions.
Spotter Global, the pioneer of compact surveillance radar for security purposes, collaborates with GeoPraevent to establish reliable avalanche detection radars in high-risk areas. Spotter Global radars currently monitor avalanche activity at the Matterhorn in the Alps and Little Cottonwood Canyon in Southern Utah.
Understanding Avalanche Detection Systems
A reliable avalanche forecast is vital for the safety of those participating in winter sports and recreation. To update such forecasts with real-time data, avalanche detection systems continuously monitor slopes to alert users about emerging, impending, and evolving dangers.
Avalanche control systems, such as those developed in partnership with GeoPraevent, combine a number of technologies and avalanche detection methods to make as reliable and multilayered a threat detection system as possible. These expansive systems often include radar, laser, seismic, and acoustic sensors strategically placed on or near known avalanche paths.
Resilient to bad weather and low visibility, these systems can verify the presence of snow slabs and pileups on high-risk terrain, adjust forecasts, and send out appropriate cautions. As soon as an avalanche is detected (whether triggered by a recreationist or not), a signal is sent, warning nearby recreationists,directing traffic lights to change, and directing drivers to safer routes.
Another option is to simply trigger the avalanche on purpose when no potential victims are near or would be near the projected debris flow. Artificially triggered avalanches are an established method of protecting recreationists, alpine residents, and travelers. The successful blasting of avalanche-ready snow slabs, usually with either long-distance projectiles or through towers erected on avalanche terrain, prevents recreationists from triggering avalanches themselves and anyone from getting hurt.
How Radar Enables Effective Avalanche Monitoring
Short- to mid-range radars are commonly used in large area monitoring projects, very often for perimeter security purposes around airports, substations, government and military facilities, and large private properties.
Fortunately, for the most advanced radar systems, there is little mechanical difference in identifying the movements of criminal intrusions and identifying avalanche movements.
The radar sends out low-frequency electromagnetic radio waves, which bounce off the landscape and return to the radar, bringing back information on anything in the landscape that has moved/is moving, including its size, speed, and direction. Because the radar continuously sends out and receives several radio waves per second and updates its "read" on the landscape just as quickly, the data is real-time. The moment any significant amount of snow slab moves, the avalanche is displayed in the radar readout with precision. For many systems, the detection of an avalanche automatically cues integrated PTZ cameras to monitor and perhaps visually record the avalanche in action.
The radars ensure that both natural and artificially triggered avalanches and other dangerous slides of natural material are monitored reliably, providing peace of mind to those in charge of protecting avalanche-prone areas and those traversing them.
What are the Benefits and Features of Radar in Avalanche Detection?
Advantages of Using Radar for Avalanche Control
The integration of radar monitoring with safety systems enables reliable, high-quality avalanche protection, even in areas that can only be monitored remotely. Remote radar systems can be set up with solar panel charging so that they don't have to be connected to a mains power source. This way, the radar systems can remain in operation in the field for months or even years without on-site maintenance. Overall, radar systems significantly improve avalanche management, allowing experts and calibrated systems to interpret data and respond swiftly to prevent harm.
Real-Time Monitoring Capabilities
With continuous radar systems, avalanche events are registered in real-time, no matter the time of day or weather. Vitally, when radars are linked to the right integrated command and control centers, such as NetworkedIO™ (NIO), they can trigger immediate safety responses and notifications at the very instant an avalanche, landslide, rockslide, or mudslide begins.
Early Warning Systems and Alerts
This early warning index ensures that no people are exposed to danger. The radar system can do more than trigger an alarm; properly integrated automated systems can alert local authorities, change traffic lights, lower traffic barriers, initiate evacuations (even at night if necessary), and more.
What Technical Data is Associated with Radar Systems?
Understanding Radar Measurements and Their Importance
The technical data associated with most radar systems includes the radar's range, meaning the greatest distance at which the radar will pick up movement, the overall area coverage, usually expressed in acres or metric units squared, the horizontal and vertical opening angles, the radar's weight, unit dimensions, and energy consumption.
What Reference Projects Showcase Successful Avalanche Radar Applications?
What Are Some Examples of Locations That Have Installed Avalanche Radar Systems And Found Success?
Several successful installations of avalanche radar systems have showcased their effectiveness in real-time snowpack monitoring. Inhabited alpine areas like the Saas Valley and Weissmies in southern Switzerland, as well as various locations in the United States, Norway, Chile, and Canada, utilize these radar technologies to monitor for potential ice avalanches.
What Additional Technologies Complement Avalanche Detection Radar?
PTZ cameras, seismic sensors, geophones, and 3D laser measurement devices can all complement and enhance the avalanche detection work of compact surveillance radars.
Other helpful technologies in this field include the text and traffic control systems that keep alpine residents and visitors safe, avalanche towers for triggering controlled release avalanches, avyx platforms that aid in monitoring endangered areas in order to make sure unsuspecting recreationists aren't caught in controlled release avalanches, and more.
The Future of Radar for Avalanche Monitoring
Every year, scientific publications provide more valuable insights and research findings on how avalanches develop and how avalanche fatalities can be avoided. The more advanced monitoring systems are deployed, the more data experts are able to collect, which allows for the improvement of prediction models and the further development of avalanche detection technologies.
Wherever the snow slides next, Spotter Global is proud to be a part of ensuring people stay safe while on the beautiful snow slopes of the world.