Small or otherwise?
Scary?

Yes, big slide many years ago.
Wrote about it in another thread a while ago.
Will try to dig it for you.
Was a follow-up on an interesting article posted by Montoya.
Scary? Oh yes. When your legs feeled like water you know you had a nice scare.

Got stuck in a slide once. It was scary.
I jumped in a fresh deep snowpack and it started to slide and I was sucked into the snow. Luckily it stopped before I was completely swallowed by the white monster. My head and arms where still free so I could dig myself out, although it took some time.
All this happened inside the resort boundaries.

But rather this than sommersaulting over a cravesse Plake-style in Chamonix what I saw a friend of mine doing once.

ahhhhhh, here is the link:

http://www.skijapanguide.com/cgi-bin/ubbcgi/ultimatebb.cgi/topic/1/5152.html?

Sanno, what is Plake-Style?
Your friend sounds like he has a death wish.

I was in a small one last year. Probably class 1. Took me for a little ride before I was able to fight it out to the side. Pretty scary. But educational at the same time.

Toque, how does the classification work?

This is taken from Canadian Avalanche Assosiation

-Size 1 avalanches are relatively harmless to people. They typically have:

a mass of 10 tonnes
a path length of 10 metres
an impact pressure of 1 kiloPascal

-Size 2 avalanches could bury, injure or kill a person. They typically have:

a mass of 100 tonnes
a path length of 100 metres
an impact pressure of 10 kiloPascals

-Size 3 avalanches could bury and destroy a car, damage a truck, destroy a small building, or break a few trees. They typically have:

a mass of 1000 tonnes
a path length of 1000 metres
an impact pressure of 100 kiloPascals

-Size 4 avalanches could destroy a railway car, large truck, several buildings, or a forest area up to 4 hectares (~10 acres). They typically have:

a mass of 10,000 tonnes
a path length of 2000 metres
an impact pressure of 500 kiloPascals

-Size 5 avalanches are the largest snow avalanches known. They could destroy a village or a forest area up to 40 hectares (~100 acres). They typically have:

a mass of 100,000 tonnes
a path length of 3000 metres
an impact pressure of 100 kiloPascals

Thanks Toque, interesting.
I guess that made the one I was in about a 2.5 ish I guess. Enuff to bury somebody.

iwas in a pretty good sluff one and that was enough to scare me. buried to the waist

That scaling system has tickled me for some time. I am really not sure if I can perceive the difference in snow force required to damage a small truck, but not destroy a railway car. It just isn’t a sense of force that is native to my mind.

That's really scary SerreChe. You must have been shitting yourself.

On some hikes in Canada I have been on I will come accross a slide path and near the bottom see huge trees that have been ripped in half. Some of them 1-2 metres wide.
Would be wild to see a slide like that come down. From a safe area of course.

Yes Toque, I was shitting myself. Did not have a beacon in those days either, but all you had to do to find me was to follow the brown trail. I agree with you that it was educational, glad my first lesson was not the last one.

34, it is true that these scale notions are a bit subjective and depend on many factors. I guess they are probably just rough guidelines. Knowing your scientific inclinations I can understand that it tickles you a bit ...

Remember the Blizzard of Aahhs where Plake first jumps from under the bridge at Les Grand Montets in chamonix.
Upon landing he starts cartwheeling further down and over a big cravesse. If my friend touched the snow just 1 meter earlier he would have made a dive into the belly of the glacier. Seeing this really made me think twice about skiing (off-piste) in glacier terrain.
We had a guide with us. He knew what place to avoid but if you fall there is no way you can steer yourself clear of these things.

Scary stuff, avis.

..the Blizzard of Aaahhs, a GREAT movie!!...Went and saw Touching the Void last weekend. I shXX you not, a must see movie. They shot on location, parts of it anyway, around Chamonix… I’ve always liked suspense-thriller flicks. Having mother nature as the source puts new meaning into the genre of film...Haven’t seen a good flick like that in quite some time..

Ran into Plake skiing at Kirkwood about 15yrs ago. Cool guy. Was skiing down the Wall when I noticed a few – at the time, thought they were pretty damn awesome – dudes just taking HUMUNGOUS air off the top of the huge cornis along the ridge to the right. turns out they were warming up for a shoot. I came down one run and Plake, takin a breather, said something to the effect, hey man, we’re going to be shooting and so ll be closing this area off, or something like that. Thought, cool..so such was my brush w/ a ski legend..Scott Schmidt also used to make in person appearances at ski movie screenings, etc. A real low key, down to earth, real cool guy.…I’m dating myself, but still think Scott Schmidt is and has always been one of the BEST, true, pure, smoothassmXXaXXXXin SKIERs of all time, here on this planet. He is one smooth skier.

..all this really doesn’t have a lot to do w/ avis and sort of went off on my own tangent - sumimasen - but noticed an article on CNN:

http://edition.cnn.com/2005/US/02/16/extreme.skier.death.ap/index.html

Rip, Alec.

Thanks for the explanation Sanno. Doing a flip above a crevasse somewhere in Chamonix is not my idea of fun, although seeing it must have been impressive. I am truly sorry guys, but I have never seen the movie and I do not know who Plake or Schmidt are. I am sure the movie has some great scenery / stunts and that these 2 guys are great skiers. I swear, I have not lived in a cave for the last 20 years either. I ski / board for my own enjoyment and do not tend to worry about whose hip or not and what movie is good or not. Maybe it is a sign that I am already an Ogi san. The other day on TV, I stumbled on one of those ski movies. It was absolutely assenine! Some kids boarding behind a train, some terrorists at the top of the mountain, some rock music, etc... Basically for people who have not yet finished their puberty.

I am sure it was just bad luck and that other movies are a lot better.

an oji san?? you're still a pup, Serre. It sounds like you just happened upon a really bad movie.. don't know if you'd be able to find a copy anywhere, but keep an eye out for Aaahhs, released, either in the late 80s or early 90s. Greg Stump was the filmaker. a true classic. Peace.

That sounds like a really bad movie serreche. I think I've seen adds for it.

The movies that Sanno and gti are talking about though are just balls the walls skiing. No plot really although the producers sometimes try.

Scmidt has some footage in TGR's Prophecy which was released a few years ago. While he was a great skier in his time he looked shaky coming down the steeps. Either that or his style is just different from what I'm used to watching. Still way better than I'll ever be though. And have to give him credit for starting the steep skiing phenomenom. I still see some of his TNF Steep Tech suits around.

Plake needs to get with the program and get on Fat skis. He is still skiiing on like 220 skinny skis. He is really good but could be so much better. He looks really clumsy when he skis on those long boards.

haven't seen Prophecy but shaky coming down steeps?? hontodesuka?

Telleboy has some scary tales to tell about Avies, havent seen him around the forum for a while.

Plake style? I am guessing it refers to the crazy mohawked extreme skier Glen Plake.

Hey Snowglider, Im still alive and kickin. Been way to busy to spend time on the forum. Im clockin about 60 - 70 days skiing so far. North side of Happo was sick today, a good 30cm of fresh from yesterday, FatTwins tracks out there showed he had a good time today too. He poached alot of the lines before me, was runnin abit slow after yesterdays awesome day.
Ive been caught and buried 2x, they sucked, nearly pissed my pants in the first one, I had good friends, they dug me out fast!

damn telleboy. 2xs?! What, once wasnt enough for ya?? :p

Hope to see you up in Hakuba before you and the missus take off. How much longer you around for? Will head up next time fattwins goes fo sure. Cheers!

Good to meet you Saturday night Telleboy. Always good putting names to faces.

Was really cool looking up at Happo from the bottom. FT and my tracks being the only 2 tracks going right down the middle of that face.

Fattwins and I were getting into some scary places on Saturday. Traversing into the chute that we always hit at Tsugaike the snow was fracturing and sliding everywhere. I dropped down a little and snuggled up to a tree. Fattwins was about 10 metres above me. He came down slowly and when he got a bit closer it all ripped away and took him for a little ride. He quickly grabbed a tree and was able to self arrest. Crazy scary watching all the snow fracture like that and slide right past. The crown was about 50 cm's and slid on a harder layer that wasn't from the rain. The snow that slid seemed to be all wind deposited. Not to sure how far it went but it was moving at a good pace when it went over a roll. The tighter trees would have broken up the blocks but if it hit the chute it would have really sped up and may have triggered something else.
We remained calm throughout the entire thing and spent a few minutes discussing our options after. Decided to bail off the line and traversed to a safer area. We safe zoned it all across the face one at a time and it slid quite often. I had to grab onto a few trees as the snow started moving all around me. But we made it to an area we knew to be safe and had a wild run down.

damn, N. faces were sliding like crazy eh?

Glad yall were ok!

Dude that was a scary moment indeed. All that can be said is thank the lord that it didnt/couldnt start 10meters higher or i might have a broken leg at least.

The lines dude so many to remember. The mid day rippers down the open faces on sat. or the north face on sunday. but it is great to look up at the end of the day from the parking lot and point out your sic lines.

Guys, were skippin out of Hakuba on the 23 March, fly out on the 28th, hope to catch up with you all before then. Touqe, nice to meet you last weekend, sorry I was a bit unsociable, was toasted to bits!!hope to see you again before I leave, Its dumpin hard here !!!!!!!!

telly we will be up next weekend. we are planning lines from happo or 47, are you in?

Yeah man, Im up for it, dropped some lines yesterday up higher off skyline 1 but it was abit late in the day and thing were getting pretty goopy, Dave hiked up to the cairn just below Happo ike and his lines looked sweeeeeet! havent talked to him about the conditions up there yet but that might be a go this weekend. Im keen anyway, see you when you get here,

That's okay. I was concentrating on the lady sitting beside me anyways.

Can't wait for this weekend. Will be good to get some roudier(sp????) lines in.