Over the years, the funding associated with the Olympic events has helped pioneer world class avalanche programs, and has pushed the industry to progress in a very positive way. You could probably even say that without the Olympics, avalanche programs in general might not be operating at a level they are today. One example that comes to mind is the1960 Squaw Valley games. Renowned avalanche hunter Monty Atwater was named the guy in charge, and went on to lead the development of a forecasting program that was carried out successfully during the games. Atwater moved from Utah and is credited with many inventions as a Snow Ranger here, such as avalanche trip wires for instant notification when an avalanche occures, and a derived system that is still used today. He also began using one of the very first versions of the some of the first explosives to initiate avalanches, and began using one of the very first pneumatic "avalaunchers". See his great article "I Kill Avalanches".
Another came from the preparation of the 2002 Salt Lake games. This was when the UDOT program in Provo Canyon was created, and likely the reason I have a job there today.
Now, Rosa Khutor in Russia will be the site of the 2014 winter Olympics, and another avalanche program which has greatly benefited from the funds awarded with the bid.
The climate of the Caucasus Mountain Range lends itself to heavy precipitation during prolonged storm systems, all a result of the area being a perfect confluence of cold, continental air from the NW, and warm, moisture laden air rolling off the Black Sea. The top of the ski area sits at 2330m ASL, and according to experts interviewed in Bourjaillat et al 2012, storms often come in warm and wet, with the rain/snow line starting as high as 2300m, before cooling off and lowering in elevation. During a storm of this type snowfall totals of 1m are common. The finish zone for many of the races looms underneath some massive starting zones, with snowpack depths deeper than 4m expected. Additionally, the low elevation of the freestyle events are potentially within the runout zone for glide avalanches, which are known as some of the most difficult to forecast.
The initiation of the Rosa's avalanche program began in 2003 with a contract to the SLF in Switzerland to make an initial assessment on the area. Later, they teamed up with another company and the risk assessment and program development got under way. Rosa Khutor is by far the largest ski area in Russia. Situated in an area that receives such heavy snowfalls, combined with complex terrain to go with it, the avalanche protection program has to be top notch. 43 Gazex, an avalauncher, a whole bunch of heavy equipment and a team of at least 4 make up the pieces of this program.
On top of this, much passive protection structures have been built. Deflection dams, snownets, snow drift fences were experimented with, etc. Bourjaillat et al (ISSW 2012) states that they deployed 4m high snow nets for anchoring the snowpack in place at the mid-elevations during the 2011-12 season, but they were filled up to the top. This was considered an average season, regarding snowfall.
Normally, very few skiers seem to actually visit the area, and a friend who went to Russia a few seasons ago told me they would be closing the place for two years in preparation for the games. That was 2011-12 and 12-13. When he went (February 2010) he reported top to bottom powder runs, all day long, with hardly anybody else to help track it out. Normally, skier compaction is a very valuable tool to help inhibit avalanches, but when skier compaction can't be utilized due to lack of skiers what do you do? Why, you just run a cat up an down the slope many hundreds of times after each snowfall starting early season. That is how they plan to break up the layering structure in order to inhibit avalanches without use of explosives. This "work hardening" technique seems to be an ingenious way to do it, if not time intensive and laborious.
And why so many Gaz-ex for a relatively small area? Because hand charges were decided against by the Russian government for the games. Many locations where smaller volume Gaz-ex are located could easily have been managed by hand charges. Cost benefit? Much faster control missions, much more expensive (at least for the short term). Also, thats quite a lot of potential plumbing problems with the Gaz-ex...
When you can't use det cord and explosives to knock off large cornices, how do you manage the cornice problem? Large machinery. They have been using an excavator to knock down large blocks of cornice and send 'em down the hill.
Only time will tell if all of these efforts will be put to the test or not. The games are upon us, and will happen whether we are ready or not. Now, in the case of a prolonged storm system, it seems possible that we could see mandatory evacuations of some areas that plan to hold thousands of people viewing. If we do see the arrival of a big storm, it will surely get interesting, and avalanche hunters all over the world will be watching.
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