Recently Digitized Historic Reports Give Glimpses Into the Early Days of Avalanche Research

If you’ve ever taken an avalanche class in the United States, then it’s likely that your instructor has at least a tenuous connection to Ed LaChapelle. As a snow and avalanche researcher and educator for more than thirty years, LaChapelle had a hand in developing most aspects of modern avalanche safety, from the invention of the avalanche transceiver to forecasting in backcountry avalanche centers and mitigating avalanches with explosives. LaChapelle got his start in avalanche science at Switzerland’s Institute for Snow and Avalanche Research in the 1950s. The SLF (acronym from the original German name) has been conducting research on snow and avalanches since 1938.

Recently, the SLF completed digitizing over 700 research reports and avalanche observations from 1938 to 2005 and released them to the public in a free, online repository. Many of the documents, especially from before 1990, are in German but offer a glimpse into the early days of snow science, with some of the first examples of snow pit profiles and early research into avalanche barriers. 



Scanning through the titles of the reports in the archive gives a sense of how varied the field of snow science can be. From highly technical reports on mathematical models for avalanche dynamics and snow crystal nucleation to observations on avalanche control with dynamite and research trips to the arctic, the SLF has played a driving role in nearly every aspect of snow science. 



One particular report from 1960 details a trip Andre Roch, Assistant Director of the SLF, made to Iran to assess the avalanche risk and possible mitigation measures for a major highway between Tehran and Chalous. The trip was motivated by an avalanche on the highway in the winter of 1959 that buried a bus, killing 26 people. During his three month stay, Roch made measurements of the weather and snowpack, designed snow fences and barriers that would lessen avalanche risk, and conducted drills with the Iranian military to use mortars during storms to trigger avalanches. 

The digitization of so many historical records from the early days of avalanche science gives the public a chance to see where our system of avalanche education and mitigation came from. Despite efforts by the Open Access movement in science, a lot of modern and historical science still remains behind a paywall on publisher websites. The availability of historical records from the SLF is an important step from the snow science community towards public access to scientific research. 



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