Chris Hopkins

I'm new here Jon, should I have placed this factual information that concerns Public Safety in the "spray" Zone instead. But I am interested in your argument on how you believe that what I'm talking about is as you say "conjecture". Could you be more specific? Because it seems like when you accuse someone of a continued Vendetta, that sounds like conjecture and leans towards a personal attack. Maybe it would have been better to contact me via a personal message concerning this? I'm very open to civil discussions and debate, however that doesn't seem to be the norm at these types of sites when it concerns controversial Public Safety issues. I was pretty specific when I first started posting here that cc would be harboring a Divergent point of view. For some reason I thought your site was different and was open to intelligent debate. Am I wrong? From the TAY site owner. "Many of his posts contain valuable discussions, even if sometimes extremely controversial."

So nwac contacted the. 4-4 observation poster quoted above and told that person that they were going to edit the observation because they did not have a pro observer in the area. The following phrase was edited out of observation. "Pro Observer spotted at Blue pk cornice and exposed 35 deg. + open snowfield approach under cornice on 4-3 , no report filed ? For me it begs the question on why nwac did not contact me when they deleted my observation that was posted on March 2nd concerning two significant Avalanches that I observed on March 1st. Those two natural release avalanches that I observed were an indication of weak bonding strength between the new snow and the old snow, one of which had a start Zone on a wind loaded Ridge and ran 800 vert feet. I had also reported that we came across fresh skier tracks in the vicinity of the very fresh debris pile and did a quick transceiver search just to be sure. Two days after my observation was posted and then pulled from the nwac site (I believe on March 3rd) we suffered our very first BC skier Avalanche related fatality in my home area on the east side of the North Cascade crest.(east of rainy pass) Although I contacted nwac for an explanation on why they deleted my observation, I never received an email back from them. My observation included my email address and my phone number. And remember the reason why my posts and threads over the last 7 years at TAY were deleted was because of nwac member pressure. http://www.turns-all-year.com/skiing_snowboarding/trip_reports/index.php?topic=40285.25 Posts: 227 WWW Re: helli ski info « Reply #38 on: 03/24/18, 04:09 PM » I’ll try adding some more detail than I did i my last post. Marcus messaged me privately about HFNC / Freeski on March 8th. I asked him about deleting topics and posts as a simple question and he just went ahead and did it point blank. I realize that Marcus should not have been involved in the first place, but it seems that NWAC members reached out to him rather than Micah or myself. This is not putting blame on Marcus, Freeski should have just been banned temporarily or permanently. Many of his posts contain valuable discussions, even if sometimes extremely controversial. Nwac remains silent on this issue.

That's a cool feature with the photos. Beautiful Terrain. The dude in the Healey Hansen jacket and his partner look familiar to me. Have you been up to the east side North Cascades along hwy 20 and met a guy that looks like an old curmudgeonly, homeless crack addict? That would be me.

observation from the nwac site for yesterday .posted here in case nwac decides to delete another significant observation. note, this is not my nwac obs. I did observe the two gentleman on 4-3 picking up helicopter landing stakes from the area and climbing under the top cornice and off to the lookers left wall side where one of the gentlemen fell into a hole, at the rock wall snow interface, up to his waist after taking off skis to Boot the rest of the pitch. When the lead climber reached the top it appeared that he no longer had eyes on his partner while his partner was climbing the last critical step. He was however under continual observation by me and my partner and we did not leave the area while that climber was exposed. "Recreational Observation Liberty Bowl , N.face. Climbed LaCHAPELL avy cord safe rt. Decended "Carpetbaggers Cash" run. Pro Observer spotted at Blue pk cornice and exposed 35 deg. + open snowfield approach under cornice on 4-3 , no report filed ? April 4, 2018, 3:33 p.m. PST Weather: Snowing , lt .wind 34 deg. increasing snow. Snowpack: 8" soft warm snow over crust and wind affected surface . No pit diggers present. Area Description: Hwy 20 , NCH , Washington Pass. Avalanches: Natural release off E. face above Blue lake creek . D2 / D3 / R1 and many falling blocks of cornice chunks and ice reaching road from all L.B. chutes and some Cuthroat Chutes. Observation by Huggin ,Munnin and Yehl Latitude: 48.508276 Longitude: -120.658421 Did you see any avalanches?Yes Did you trigger any avalanches? No Was anyone caught in an Avalanche? No

Here is a test "on the wrong picture of what's going on" Consider the following quote from a recent online article. Is the information correct? https://crosscut.com/2018/04/avalanche-forecasters-grapple-deadly-season "Thin lines running horizontally indicated rain storms over the last few months of winter weather that were buried in the snowpack. On the surface, skiers might know these as rain crusts that make for bad skiing. Once buried, these so-called “weak layers” might not hold when skiers or a snowmobile glide on top of them, causing the entire snowpack above to slide."

Yea, seems Elementary. Yet, How many times have we heard after a near miss or fatal avalanche accident that group did not see any signs of instability and the group though that they did everything right including digging a pit, and yet something was obviously missed. Or one of the members of a bc skier group was hit by an avalanche triggered by the second skier or so skier, because they had not found an island of safety (or didn't think there was a need) in avalanche Terrain while waiting for the rest of the group to descend. Situational awareness is a skill that needs to be practiced and good habits formed. That would include practicing best safety protocols even while away from the mountains such as putting the phone down in the car and focusing on the critical task at hand. "When we look at where people screw up....., they’re often doing the right decision for what they think is happening, but they have the wrong picture of what’s going on."

Quote from article on situational awareness. Well worth a read. Job safety and Mountain safety definitely have crossover skills. https://www.spe.org/en/print-article/?art=3129 "The Basics of Situation Awareness Defined as the perception of elements in the environment within a volume of time and space, the comprehension of their meaning, and the projection of their status in the near future, Endsley said situation awareness is critical for effective decision making. Onsite workers with strong situation awareness can often anticipate issues that may arise with a project, or the effects of activities on safety. “When we look at where people screw up and where they have problems doing things, they’re often doing the right decision for what they think is happening, but they have the wrong picture of what’s going on. If you want to solve this human performance with checklists and procedures, that’s great, but there’s still this whole problem of going down and understanding what’s the situation or what procedure will be employed at this time,” Endsley said."

Yesterday at blue peak area, north face. 6" new at 6500' previous night. snow and sun showers with wind gusts contributing to Crossload wind slab formation and drifts in places. Since I was solo' I avoided "Good2Go" bowl that day but still managed to find myself in one spot I didn't like. Fortunately I was able to ski a bit of steeper wind scour to avoid skiing the adjacent wind transported snow slope.

A friend of mine estimated that 600 people were on the Maple Pass Loop one day (hwy20 rainy pass) during the fall larch color change. He based his estimate on the number of parked cars. The lot was full with cars parked along the exit road shoulder, and a quarter mile. along hwy 20 in each direction. I know a lot of people, including myself, are heading off trail as a result of the over crowding. A lot of us have been around long enough to witness the times before the spiderwork of social and climber trails developed, some of which I have contributed to reinforcing. Of course the result is poorly executed steep trails that erode and pass through sensitive areas. Is the solution more developed trails, or take a number and queue up for your start time?

When I saw the movie 'Minority Report', with all its Iris scanning on the streets and by nano bots and targeted advertisements , I thought yeah that's where we're heading in some shape or form. Let's enjoy what we have while we have it. You never know when your entire 7-year history is going to get censored and deleted from a website, because you upset the status quo. Will that site's action keep me from entering Canada at somepoint? Will I have to explain the circumstances at the border? It would be like " yeah I was talking about Public Safety and...". The following pic is from the movie "Brazil".

I was up skiing yesterday Northside Blue Peak. Big winds is the story up there. My first lap we skied on the skiers left side below the ridge walls (good2go bowl) trying to find a powder seam. All the tracks that we had made in that same Bowl two days prior were filled in with wind transported snow, so the skiing was okay. On the second lap all the wind transported snow in that same Bowl had been transported somewhere else because all the old tracks from the prior two days were now visible and etched into the slope so the skiing in that area was not quite so good on the Wind hammered surface. A friend of mine describes the conditions as "crappy", but he's been used to ripping powder most of the winter and we are now in that Springtime snow transition period. It's pretty clear the strong winds have been depositing wind drifts on the higher elevations terrain features creating pillows and increasing the fluting along many of the walls. One notable surface wind slab Avalanche occurred yesterday on the south face of Whistler Mountain. It ripped out below the summit pyramid rock face where the snow field starts. Fairly steep in that area and guess of crown depth would be 2 feet or less, but pretty hard to tell from my vantage point.My guess would be something fell out of the Rock's to trigger that. I was looking over at the "Whistler's Mother" couloir and remembering an old ski mentor who skied that gully on pin gear many years ago, in the era of leather boots. Three days ago that gully had a wind drift across it about Midway and yesterday the line connected up. Or maybe it was me who was being transported.

Peace out.

Don't know if this has been posted yet. http://methowvalleynews.com/2018/02/16/rco-grants-will-support-trail-campground-maintenance-projects/ "The goal of the project is to educate climbers on environmentally and socially responsible climbing practices, collect data on use and resources, identify environmental impacts, continue building relationships with the climbing community, and enforce regulations. Funding for the climbing rangers is provided through the Nonhighway and Off-Road Vehicle Activities (NOVA) program of the RCO. "

That looks like a old video and attitudes have changed, except at Alta of course. I think there's little doubt that snowboarding had revitalized cash flow to ski areas. (I'm not a snowboarder by the way.) With the invention of the splitboard, opinions in the backcountry also have changed because skier skin tracks getting post holed by snowshoes or boots is less common these days. I remember back in the early 80s when I first got into leather boots and skinny Telemark skis, a few alpine skiers would approach me to tell me my turns were too wide and that maybe I should stay out of the ski areas and head off-piste. It's not the snowboards or even the Telemark skis that were the problem. Attitude is everything.

Don't desire a service, but I'm kind of partial to Brian Eno's, 'an ending (ascent)'. If I die in the mountains by avalanche (not my plan btw), i would hope there would be a lessons learned discussion concerning the f-up I made by my peers on line. Don't hold back on my account. I would also hope that nwac would respect my wishes and let my Bro's do any formal analysis in feet and inches so any report could be understood, you know, in this country . Irishmen typically go out with a party. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo:_Atmospheres_and_Soundtracks "This music was originally recorded in 1983 for a feature-length documentary movie called "Apollo" later retitled For All Mankind, directed by Al Reinert." you all have some interesting threads here.

Agree. Understanding the basic science of stable-unstable systems and the variables that affect that system are helpful in performing risk analysis. Snow, (complex natural system)stability-instability is an energy equation with many variables to consider. I find it useful to know what those variables are within the system, how they interact, and keep track of those variables as consistently as possible. Pits can not and should not be considered a short cut to what really needs to be learned and the time needed to observe the mountains. I wonder how many people give pits alot of weight in risk analysis, even though all the material on the subject warns against that practice? For a simple read at k-12 level (my level) https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://ngss.sdcoe.net/Disciplinary-Core-Ideas/DCI-Physical-Sciences/PS2C-Stability-and-Instability-in-Physical-Systems&ved=2ahUKEwjAqZ3m8oraAhUDzmMKHWhuAn8QFjAAegQICBAB&usg=AOvVaw297Ih2hWtyCP2zm6REpEZG Story to convey just a few variables. A friend of mine, years ago, dug a pit at the top of south side Blue Peak, Wa Pass, after the group skied and skinned back up. He cracked the supporting crust, most likely at the weakest point on that slope and the whole slope avalanched to the ground and ran it's historical path down to Copper Creek. Based upon consistant observation of the variables at the time, that slope was off my "to do list". I was skiing same south aspects at lower altitutudes, less steep, more anchors, Same basel weak layer typical of early snow followed by extended artic air mass.