just for the record

http://www.snownews.jp/modules/news/article.php?storyid=399
http://www.asahi.com/national/update/1123/TKY200511230219.html
http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/national/news/20051123i313.htm
http://www2.knb.ne.jp/news/20051123_5299.htm
http://headlines.yahoo.co.jp/hl?a=20051123-00000313-yom-soci

topo map of the area:
http://watchizu.gsi.go.jp/watchizu.aspx?latitude=36.56971944&longitude=137.6038972

search for "浄土山" for the other location and photos, eg
http://images.search.yahoo.co.jp/bin/que...ei=UTF-8&fr=top

video
http://www2.knb.ne.jp/news/asp/XVideoView_h.asp?Order=20051123_5299_h&HeadLine=20051123_5299.txt

Yes, sad news - we will have a little to say on that on the Hakuba Now page, updated soon (we were having a few technical problems with it).

Here is the page:

http://www.snowjapan.com/e/daily/hakuba-now.php

The beacon didnt save the guy...

He was found in the danger time though. CPR is a given on the slopes ill be brushing mine up ASAP. also thinking about an ava lung asap.

Im still unsure about where this slide actually happened but I can say this. There were rocks everywhere mostly you could see them but if he hit rocks it would/could have had a huge impact on the outcome.

This is also on the other page but
I'm pretty sure it happened on the NW slope of peak 2831 around 2700 metres
Murodo bus station is at the top left




Like FT said there is a ton of rocks in that area so he probably died of trauma when the cornice collapsed

A beacon in no way guarantees your survivial in an avalanche

Thats what I meant.

Tsondaboy, wearing a beacon gives you something like an extra 10% chance of survival or something like this if I remember correctly (do not quote me on this). Pray your buddies have praticed with their equipment and can dig you out quickly. Death rate is exponential as time ticks...

Sadly enough, the beacon usually guides mountain rescue to a body.

I Read the article put-up by Montoya about an avie in CO (Berthoud pass). One point I do remember vividly of the account was: "The plastic blades were useless".

So serious buddies who know how to use their beacon and who carry metal blades will probably go a long way towards increasing your safety.

FT, the avalung sounds pretty good (it is smaller now as well) but I think you are supposed to have the mouth-piece inside your mouth all the times... Not sure I could do it. Also, do you have to wear it outside your clothes in order for it to effectively extract O2 from the snow-packs?That airbag pack sounds interesting as well. That is standard equipment for some of the foreign-run heli ops in Russia nowadays... Not sure which is better. The airbag sounds less intrusive, it is like a standard BC pack with space for your gear, you pull a rip-cord just like on a parachute.

Start a run and stick the mouth piece in your mouth. its like a mouth gaurd. I dont think that I could cart in an air bag into the mountains.

fair enough. Not sure how heavy it is. I saw it inflated, the material looks pretty light, not sure how heavy the gas cartridge is that goes along...

btw, backcountry.com has a package for those interested:

QuickDraw 190 probe + Avalung II + Tele Lynx Shovel for USD 168.95 before shipping...

many thanks for this soubriquet!

What's the differance there than with a contour map?

Better say: Try to avoid too steep slopes, that have high potential of an avie occurance.

Good job there soubriquet!

PS: which program do you use to do the calculation/plot?

tateyama was setting up to kill people it is good that it is closed now.

I think it's more that so many people are up there looking for 1st tracks that they go far to fast (not speed) and don't look at the risks

FYI. A freind of a friend of mine reported;
On Nov.13 Tateyama, SaruMata-no-curl had good powder snow (not so dry) covering 500m alt def from the top of Mt.Oyama. He enjoyed skiing. On contrast, Yamazaki curl was absolutely icy like a skate rink. He descended down by crampons.

thats true toque but the pack was building bad layers due to wind, sun etc. those factors times the amount of people wanting the goods was not setting up well.

Snowconnection, lucky your friend had crampons!
Sorry, but what is a "curl"?

Sorry for using a wrong English "curl". It is "cirque" in English. The geographical term is well-known among Japanese montaineers and hikers pronouncing "curl". The pronounciation comes from Germanic "kar".

Glad we got that figured out
I was a little confused as well

Not really sure why Japanese peopley use curl though. As a a cirque does not curl at all.

I could see using curl for cornice as they somtimes curl. But a cirque does not curl.

This country can be very strange sometimes

Thank you SnowConnection for the clarification. It is much easier for me to understand now. It is interesting to see how the Japanese people use foreign words which they have adapted their own way (Pan, Marron, etc...). Sometimes the new meaning is not so obvious for non-japanese like us though!

Yes, strange indeed.

Mont Blanc -> monburan -> Ran Monbu

Did not know that one either.

just revisiting this thread, I met up with a riding mate recently and it turns out the guy that died in the tateyama slide used to be his boss. he talked to the surviving members afterwards (he wasn't there at the time) and said that they were skinning up in poor visibility conditions when the slide caught them all from above. later when visibility improved, there was a skier's line at the top of the slide. they are not sure 100% if that was the cause, but it doesn't look good.

That's interesting Montoya. I remember reading somewhere that those guys had ventured on a cornice in very bad vis and that the said cornice broke and took them down.

That sucks if a skier cut the slope above them. I would rather be caught in a slide because of my personal failure to assess risks properly than because of a third party's recklessness.