Snowmobiler incident eastern Wa.

If you haven't seen the video of the snowmachiner who was buried a few days ago, it's interesting. Clips can be seen at the major broadcasters web sites. The avalanche was relatively small and as it was running out of steam & coming to a stop, a guy laid down prone on his stomach and was completely covered. Had he remained upright, I rather doubt this would have done more than knocked him over. My personal experiences with slides of that size / force is that standing sideways (reducing your contact profile) plant hard on the downhill ski, lean into it causes the snow to split around you and flow. Large stuff, forget this approach but small slides can be mitigated in this manner. Glad it was a shallow burial & he was quickly extricated.

Here is a link to the Youtube video.

In the interview I saw with the victim, he said at first he didn't know he was caught in an avalanche he thought he had been run over by the snowmobile.

This one was in Colorado, but is just as scary -- such an innocuous looking little road cut:

The comments made it even more interesting.

From the CAIC on the 22nd:

"Special Advisory Statement in Effect through 01/24/2012 12:00 PM

Widespread dangerous avalanche conditions exist today. ... Triggering slides will be easy today, and some of them will be bigger than what we have seen so far this winter. ... Triggering avalanches remotely and from low angle or even flat terrain is likely. Be very wary near or below any avalanche terrain, and keep in mind that even small slides can bury and kill you."