http://outside.away.com/outside/features/200504/utah-avalanche.html
> ....Maixner was an avalanche-certified
> backcountry guide with the Sandpoint-based
> Selkirk Powder Company. ...
> Maixner didn't die because he was a fool...

So true. The more training you have the more you think you know better, the more likely you are to let your guard down, the more likely you are to get caught. cqfd!

I wonder if this is in anyway related to the fact that advanced driver training does not make you chances of dying in a car crash any lower. Apparantly people have a level of risk that they are willing to accept and as their skill increases so does their speed leaving them with the same chance of dying as before they took the course. There is still the advantage of being able to go faster with the same level of risk though.
Do avalanche "experts" go to to more extreme locations/slopes and face an equal danger to less trained people that stick to generally safer terrain?
or
Perhaps "avalanche experts" spend much more time in the mountains than average joe so even if their chance of dying on a given day in the BC is much lower than average their time exposed to the risk is much longer making their overall chance of dying in an avalanche higer?

if you ever read the original piece on that avie it was pretty big. they figured that tons of people were buried. the avie released way above them on a wonky early layer. You can see better pictures at TGR the slide zone.

If I saw 100 odd tracks out there in a virtually controlled area I might head out without gear too, if I was in their position. Its hard to say cause its not like a pure BC spot. If the guy had gear it wouldnt have mattered he got slammed and broken and was dead within seconds of being overrun.