Fatal Avalanche Accidents and Forecasted Danger Levels: Patterns in the United States, Canada, Switzerland and France

Throughout the winter, avalanche forecasters issue bulletins to help the public and the managers of public facilities make avalanche safety decisions. These bulletins typically describe important snowpack features and current weather events before rating the avalanche danger on a scale of one through five. Although the character of avalanche conditions may vary between regions, the physical processes that form avalanches are universal. In addition, the methods used to forecast avalanche activity are similar throughout North America and Europe. We use the distribution of fatal avalanche accidents with respect to forecasted avalanche danger level to examine how effectively avalanche forecast groups communicate with the public and how consistent these groups are within countries and internationally. The results show that avalanche forecast groups are effectively communicating with the public when relatively benign or very dangerous conditions exist.