In the Obernberg valley, the Eastern Alps, landforms recently interpreted as moraines are re-interpreted as rock avalanche deposits. The catastrophic slope failure involved an initial rock volume of about 45 million m³, with a runout of 7.2 km over a total vertical distance of 1330 m (fahrböschung 10°). 36Cl surface-exposure dating of boulders of the avalanche mass indicates an event age of 8.6...

BACKGROUND Within Europe and North America, the median annual mortality from snow avalanches between 1994 and 2003 was 141. There are two commonly used rescue devices: the avalanche transceiver, which is intended to speed up locating a completely buried person, and the avalanche airbag, which aims to prevent the person from being completely buried. OBJECTIVE This retrospective study aimed to ...

The avalanche behavior of gravitationally forced granular layers on a rough inclined plane is investigated experimentally for different materials and for a variety of grain shapes ranging from spherical beads to highly anisotropic particles with dendritic shape. We measure the front velocity, area, and height of many avalanches and correlate the motion with the area and height. We also measure ...

We introduce the standard distribution width of fitness in the Bak-Sneppen evolution model. Through observing the fluctuation of this quantity in evolution, we find a different hierarchy of avalanche dynamics, w0 avalanche. We also obtain the corresponding gap equation and the self-organized threshold wc. The critical exponents (τ, γ and ρ), which describe the behavior of avalanche size distrib...

Snow avalanches are generally rare and occasionally extreme events. In the general context of prediction and predictably of extreme events, we will examine whether snow avalanches are predictable based on a few examples of forecasts at different scales. Clearly, avalanche predictability depends on scale. When the regional avalanche danger is High or Very High (Extreme), an avalanche is likely s...

Recently, considerable attention has been placed upon exploiting the negative-feedback effect in accelerating the quenching time of the avalanche current in passively quenched single-photon avalanche-diode (SPAD) circuits. Reducing the quenching time results in a reduction in the total charge generated in the SPAD, thereby reducing the number of trapped carries; this, in turn, can lead to impro...

Since avalanche gain and breakdown voltage in most semiconductor materials change with temperature, instruments utilizing Avalanche Photodiodes (APDs) for their avalanche gains need to incorporate either temperature stabilization or voltage adjustment in the APD operation circuits. In this work we evaluated the temperature and temporal stability of avalanche gain in Al0.85Ga0.15As0.56Sb0.44, a ...

BACKGROUND In the European Alps emergency medical helicopter services are regularly involved in avalanche rescue missions. How the helicopter emergency medical system best supports avalanche rescue missions is controversial. AIM OF THE STUDY To study advantages and limitations of the early dispatch of emergency medical helicopters after avalanche accidents. METHODS Data on rescue mission ch...