Comment by maxerickson | Hacker News Reader

Comment by maxerickson | Hacker News Reader

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Is it clearly just the education, or is it possible that people taking the courses are already at higher risk because of their existing interest in avalanche adjacent activities?

Looking at the paper, it talks about people choosing to take risks (vs the education changing their behavior):

It appears that formal avalanche education did not make victims in this study less likely to be in accidents. Across all levels of avalanche training, overall exposure scores remained about the same, suggesting that these individuals were in the business of trading off the risks of being in avalanche terrain with the perceived benefits of engaging in their chosen activity. In other words, these victims were apparently using their training to access avalanche terrain during dangerous conditions so they could more fully enjoy their sports. For these people, courses aimed avoiding avalanche hazard would have little utility, and would probably not affect fatality rates in this population significantly. This group would benefit most from courses that provided risk management tools for balancing hazard exposure with recreational objectives. A sobering implication is that such courses might be more successful at extending students’ mobility in avalanche terrain than at reducing the total number of accidents.

PDF at https://www.researchgate.net/publication/264877015_Heuristic...

> such courses might be more successful at extending students’ mobility in avalanche terrain

That's the point.

It's very easy to travel through the snow without exposing yourself to any avalanche risk: just stay away from snow that's steep enough to avalanche. If you're going "hiking on skis", that's all you need to know.

It's not quite so easy if you want to go climbing, but it isn't that hard. If an avalanche sweeps you off the mountain, your immediate problem is falling off a mountain. Being caught in an avalanche is a comparatively minor issue. So you're going to be conservative: if any kind of subtle analysis is called for, you stay in the hut, and wait until the snow is obviously stable. In climbing season, that will happen soon enough.

What's tricky is going skiing. In winter, either you're willing to take some calculated risks with avalanches, or you'll be limited to pretty boring skiing. People don't do avalanche courses to be safe (you can do that without a course). They do them to take more risks, skiing in less obviously safe conditions, and get away with it. Which is all good, provided that you're honest about what you're doing.

Maybe a good comparison is a pilot getting an instrument rating. The safest option will always be to stay on the ground in bad weather. The reason they'd get the rating is to travel reliably, but less safely, by flying through bad weather when the rewards justify the risks.

You've dismissed (or are perhaps not aware of) a substantial chunk of winter climbing with this analysis: so-called "water ice" (as opposed to "alpine ice") climbing. Waterfalls.

Approaches for winter day climbs involve skiing or snowshoeing. The calculus of avalanche risk is part of the game for climbers too else, as you put it, we'd also be limited to some pretty boring climbing.

Yea that’s “the joke”. It’s just like “sharks are harmless, more people die of vending machine accidents than shark attacks”.... people live in very close proximity to vending machines, not sharks. Same for the “most accidents happen within 25 miles of home”, yes, because you are very commonly less than 25 miles from home.

It's not particularly presented as a joke in the Times piece (or above).

And I'm perhaps being tedious, but safety is a topic where it pays to think and state things clearly.

So for instance, the instructor, rather than joking (if that is what they are doing), should state that the education often does not result in a reduction of accidents. If it is actually the case that taking the course increases accidents, they should work to revise the material.

I’m not sure if this will make you feel better but I belong to the Alpine Club of Canada and have taken some wilderness survival, risk management and first aid courses through the club. Consequently, I could just about hear how the instructor say that as I’ve been told the same thing many times.

It’s kind of like the ‘joke’ that goes:

“How do you become the best climber in the world? Become the second best and wait for the best to die.”

It isn’t funny because if you hang out at the ACC clubhouse and our official pub in Canmore often enough, you will meet some of the best climbers on earth. And there is no feeling quite like finding out that an amazing climber you had pints with the year before was swept off a mountain and died.

It’s not really a joke. It’s closer to a dark sense of near humour. But if you’re experienced enough outside to gain from more advanced survival courses, you know how dangerous your hobby is and you’re presumably intelligent enough to know that the only way to eliminate risk is to stay in town. Most of the people in my courses read incident reports as avidly as I do. We all know the commonalities and know that outdoor enthusiasts like us match the profile of the ‘typical victim’.

I don’t know if that helps because it’s a very common mindset. It’s not really a joke just more an admission that we go places that are incredibly efficient at killing us.

And I'm perhaps being tedious was my attempt to avoid the grating tone you've replied with.

And I'll still repeat myself. Someone leading a safety activity should avoid making misleading statements, regardless of whether they are serious, humorous, darkly humorous, or whatever.

Having read the paper a bit, it seems likely that people choosing to take a safety class are at a point in their activities where the familiarity and consistency heuristics are a bigger pitfall than an awareness of dangerous conditions. Of course I don't know this, my first comment is posed a question for a reason.

Why do you think the statements are misleading? They are fact.

Heck, my wilderness survival course increased my risk of dying outside. That’s true both because of inherent risk in what we do and our entire culture. It’s dark but it isn’t misleading.

Ultimately, good outdoor leaders equip you with both skill and respect for the outdoors. Knowledge comes with responsibility.

From the article:

> The problem — the primary human problem — is that people are susceptible, prideful, bullheaded, egotistic, dumbstruck and lazy. Add to this doomed slurry a little avalanche training (or what used to qualify as avalanche training, and its focus on analyzing snowpack), and people make terrible decisions with greater frequency and confidence.

Sounds like a little knowledge is dangerous

Yes, but so medium knowledge, or a ton. Risk is relatively constant as you get more experienced.

This isn't true at all. Risk is not at all constant over time. There are stats in the climbing world that are similar and it is a jagged line with risk tolerance going up, then diving down after each close call etc.. but trending upwards.

"There are old climbers and there are bold climbers but there are no old bold climbers."

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