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USFS Avalanche Center offers winter education
Published: Wednesday, November 1, 2006
You and your snowmobile buddy are highmarking on a beautiful 35-degree slope after a recent storm. You finish your run, but near the top of the snowfield your friend bogs down, gets stuck and waves for your help. What do you do?
The USDA Forest Service Mt. Shasta Avalanche Center says, “Making the right choice may not be as easy as it sounds. Making the wrong choice could mean you end up a statistic at the end of the day instead of back home.”
The Center is once again offering free avalanche awareness presentations and free avalanche transceiver clinics throughout the winter, focusing on the identification of weather, terrain, snowpack and decision-making factors that help indicate when avalanche hazards exist.
Avalanche Awareness presentations for 2006-07 are scheduled to be held at The Stage Door in downtown Mount Shasta Dec. 1 and 15, Jan. 19 and Feb. 2, all from 7 to 9 p.m.
Transceiver clinics are scheduled for Saturdays, Dec. 2 and 16 and Feb. 3. They will meet at 9 a.m. at the Fifth Season in Mount Shasta.
Every year, according to the Avalanche Center, more and more people are venturing into the backcountry and modern technology is making those trips easier with everything from friction-free touring bindings to higher-powered sleds.
Last year, 33 backcountry enthusiasts from North America never made it back home. Twenty-five of those deaths occurred in the United States, with 12 people killed while snowmobiling, six killed while backcountry skiing, four killed while boarding, and three caught while hiking or snowshoeing.
The Avalanche Center offers help that can increase the skills and knowledge needed to make critical decisions in avalanche terrain.
The Center also offers information about more indepth avalanche courses available and issues a daily Avalanche Advisory during the winter.
For more information visit www.shastaavalanche.org. The Advisory hotline is 530-926-9613.
The annual fundraiser for the Avalanche Center is scheduled for Jan. 20, 2007 when The Friends of the Mount Shasta Avalanche Center will present their 5th annual “Snowball” at the City Park in Mount Shasta, featuring dinner, live music, raffle prizes and a silent auction.
For more information about this event visit www.fmsac.org.
Copyright © 2006 Mt. Shasta News. All rights reserved.
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