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NOVA News Minutes
Forecasting Danger
(running time 01:26)
Transcript
April 25, 2003
NARRATOR: High in the Rockies, a helicopter lifts off to rescue people trapped by an avalanche, a sight that has become more common. In a recent two-week period, 14 people died in avalanches in British Columbia. In the United States, an average of 20 people die each year in avalanches often triggered by the victims themselves.
JILL FREDSTON (Co-director, Alaska Mountain Safety Center, Inc.): Avalanches don't happen by accident, they happen for particular reasons. It's the interaction of terrain and snowpack and weather that make it possible to have an avalanche. But there's no avalanche hazard until you introduce people.
NARRATOR: An avalanche happens when a new layer of snow weighs down so heavily on a weak layer of snow that the weak layer collapses. Part of the new slab breaks off and slides down the mountain. As shown on PBS'S NOVA, scientists can now measure just how weak the layers in a snowpack are and the likelihood of an avalanche. A snow micropenetrometer measures how much force it takes to break through the snow's layers. By using this probe to study snow stability, scientists will be able to improve avalanche forecasting.
KARL BIRKELAND (U.S. Forest Service National Avalanche Center): We hope to give people the tools to make better decisions in the backcountry, which will hopefully save lives.
NARRATOR: And result in safer, snow-filled vacations for all. I'm Brad Kloza.
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