Big thanks to Backcountry Access for sponsoring this avalanche education content. Check out the additional plethora of avalanche safety resources on their website.
Dialing shoveling techniques during rescue practice. Photo: Krystin Norman
Pro vs. Rec, and how to choose the avy course for you
Recently the Colorado Sun published a report offering a limited but surprising view into avalanche statistics. In the article, an avalanche instructor who surveyed backcountry travelers leaving the Vail ski resort found that 52 of the 92 survey participants reported having triggered a slide at some point in their backcountry ski experiences. Of that group, more than a third had no official avalanche education.
As backcountry skiing becomes more popular, growth in avalanche education courses is following suit. Today there are hundreds of classes available each year; the curriculum and overview is available via a simple internet search. Excuses for not having some kind of avalanche education are dwindling. However, over the past four years of helping organize various avalanche courses through my volunteer work, I have found that most people struggle to navigate the landscape of the avalanche education world.
Even though we hope that most frequent WildSnow readers don’t face these kind of problems, we are fairly certain that you may have friends that do. This post provides a high level overview of avy education options as well as advice on how you can get the most out of taking a course.
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So far I’ve personally had the opportunity to take my AIARE Level 1, Companion Rescue and AIARE Level 2 Rec courses. The information below represents what I have personally gathered from conversations with guide operations, instructors and friends. It is not intended to be a wholly comprehensive source. If you have something to add please do so in the comments.
Understanding acronyms and Pro vs. Rec
What is the difference between AAA (American Avalanche Association or A3) vs AIARE (The American Institute for Avalanche Research and Education)? One of A3’s roles is to set the guidelines and evaluation criteria for educational programs for the course structure that AIARE then uses to develop a curriculum to teach the courses. AIARE is an approved professional and recreational provider that follows A3 standards though they are not the only one. There is also American Avalanche Institute (AAI), Silverton Avalanche School, and several others. Although curriculum is similar among different course providers, this post will focus on the AIARE avalanche courses specifically as it is the most popular program that is widely available across the United States as well as internationally.
Starting in the 2017-18 winter season, there are now two types of “tracks” a student can take within the AIARE courses: professional (Pro) or recreational (Rec). Each course earns a different kind of AIARE “certification”. Students in Rec courses will receive a certificate of course completion, while students taking Pro level courses will have to pass a series of skills assessments to become certified at the specific level.
The Pro track is geared towards individuals who are pursuing professional career opportunities. An important point to highlight is that the Pro track is not reserved for individuals who want to become avalanche instructors; it is a prerequisite for other professional opportunities, such as forecasting, AMGA guiding, and certain ski patrol positions. Each course has a testing component that students need to pass to complete the course and get the certification.
The Rec track is meant for anyone who’d like to learn more about how to safely travel in the backcountry, evaluate terrain and understand how weather affects the changes in the snowpack. The Rec track has no test in order to get the “certification of course completion”; students simply need to attend all required sessions of the course. It is not a certification per say, but a stamp that you invested the time to further your avalanche education specific to AAA standards and have more knowledge than the average human; this will be your ticket to enter the Pro track or a requirement to volunteer with organizations like your local Search and Rescue.
Rec, Pro and other course options
The courses that are probably most familiar to everyone are the AIARE Level 1 and Level 2. The Level 1 and 2 now both come in Pro or Rec tracks. Another course that is part of the program is the Companion Rescue Course. This course has no prerequisites, and if desired can be taken before a Level 1. The Companion Rescue Course and Level 1 are required to get into a Level 2 course. The Companion Rescue course does not provide any certification.
As far as course structure goes, currently there are four main Rec courses:
Avalanche Awareness
AIARE Level 1
Companion Rescue
AIARE Level 2
Most Avalanche centers in the US host free Avalanche Awareness courses, which are 1.5 hour lectures providing an overview of basic knowledge to be aware of when considering traveling in uncontrolled backcountry terrain.
An AIARE Level 1 Rec course has two common formats. One consists of two evening lecture classes that last about three hours in conjunction with two eight-hour field days outside. The other option is a full three-day course, with a mix of lecture and field time. The material focuses around terrain selection and hazard recognition, including an overview of basic weather/snow patterns and rescue scenarios. The Level 1 course focuses on students being contributing members to a group in avalanche terrain.
Student learning how to use their probe in an AIARE Level 1 course at Mountain Rainier. Photo: Krystin Norman
AIARE Level 2 Rec is a three-day course, with a mix of lecture and field time each day. It dives deeply into the snow science, weather and understanding avalanche forecasting.
The Companion Rescue is a single eight-hour field day course that focuses entirely on rescue scenarios; different beacon search techniques, shoveling, probing and lots of time to practice.
AIARE Level 2 course at Stevens Pass in March 2018. Photo: Krystin Norman
For the Pro program, the courses are as follows:
AIARE Level 1 Pro (AIARE Level 1 Rec and Avalanche Rescue are pre-reqs)
AIARE Level 2 Pro
Instructor Course (only required if one is looking to become an avalanche instructor)
To take a Pro Level 1, students must have completed their Rec Level 1 and a Companion Rescue Course, as well as demonstrate proof of at least 20 days of backcountry skiing experience, where you have created trip plans and evaluated avalanche conditions.
In order to become certified to teach Level 1 courses, in addition to the Pro Level 1, one also must also take the Instructor Course, where students get to learn different teaching techniques.
After the Pro Level 1, you can take the Pro Level 2 to further enhance your technical knowledge and to teach Level 2 Rec courses. To maintain instructor status, certain refresher courses need to be taken every few years. To become a lead instructor, there are even more prereqs. (Yes, if you are adding $$ up, taking the Instructor track is quite pricey).
It is also important to note that most guiding companies offer refresher courses. If you have taken your avalanche training a long time ago, refresher courses are useful to go over familiar skills with a group and instructor. It’s all about keeping you safe and remembering to never stop practicing the basics!
Choose the right course and get the most out of it
Now that the whole structure has been laid out below are a few suggestions on how to make the most of your AIARE course.
If you are just getting into snow sports
The backcountry is not an ideal place to learn to ski or snowboard. Conditions can be variable, terrain is often more complex than at resorts and you spend a lot more time going uphill than down. Not knowing how to navigate a complex ski situation can pose a risk for you and others around you. Invest in a season pass and spend at least one season practicing your downhill skills before venturing out. At this stage, attending an Avalanche Awareness course is a good way to learn about about the basics of traveling in the backcountry.
If you are a resort skier/snowboarder and venturing into backcountry travel
AIARE Level 1 Rec course is a fantastic start for you — find a guiding company that offers the course and sign up. Learn how to use your backcountry gear before you show up for the course. You can do so by checking your local resorts’ uphill policy and testing out the bindings/skins beforehand in a safe environment. It’s also helpful to get familiar with your beacon and what all the buttons do; check out my beacon post from earlier this season, and instructional videos on beacon use.
If you are not sure that you want to spend money on a full backcountry set up yet, it is okay to rent or borrow the ski/splitboard set up for the class. It is strongly encouraged to purchase your own beacon, shovel and probe, since those items are crucial rescue gear and is important to know how to use the specific gear you own.
If you are a seasoned backcountry traveler with not formal avy training
AIARE level 1 Rec course is extremely useful refresher of knowledge you already have; it is worth the money and will challenge you in useful ways specifically helping prevent human factor from taking over. Don’t wait and just do it! I promise, you’ll learn something new; plus it’s an invaluable chance to focus on practicing avalanche skills for a few days.
If you have taken your Level 1 but not sure if you’d like to take your Level 2
AIARE Level 2 Rec is a terrific course to step up your avalanche safety education. A Level 1 course means you likely will rely solely on the avalanche forecast, which can be problematic for a variety of reasons. A Level 2 dives a lot deeper into understanding how to read the current state of the snowpack, gather observations and apply it to better understand the avalanche forecast. In the course, you will actually work to make your own avalanche forecast for the area you are in. This is an essential skill if you’re planning to venture into areas without a reliable avalanche forecast, or into areas that aren’t the focus of your local avalanche forecast (e.g. at high elevations or deep in the wilderness). If you are consistent backcountry traveler, you should absolutely consider investing into furthering your education beyond a Level 1.
Snowpits all day long – learning about different layers in the snowpack. Photo: Krystin Norman
If you have AIARE Rec Certifications and want to give back to the community
Consider becoming an Avalanche Awareness instructor and continue to work on your Professional certifications to become a professional avalanche educator. With the growing interest in backcountry travel and corresponding need for education, instructors are commonly overloaded with courses. There are also very few lead Instructors that are female in the US. I personally recommend taking the Level 2 Rec prior to taking Level 1 Pro, as it allows more time to practice your skills to feel more confident and have more experience for teaching those concepts to others.
If you are looking to become a guide
I am not qualified to give advice in this category, but if you’re on that track, you probably don’t need it anyways 🙂
Miscellaneous tips
Practice, practice, practice. Religiously check avalanche forecast. Keep in mind that the Companion Rescue course is an excellent way to refresh your skills yearly or every other year.
Education is pricey, but the price of your life or your friends life can’t be measured. We hope you consider furthering your avalanche education or continuing to stay current with your certifications.
16 comments
There are also Introduction to Avalanche courses available in some areas, typically taught in a one evening/one field day format, that can provide a starting point for those unable to commit the time and money required for a Level 1 course or wanting to enter a Level 1 course with a little more background – your local avalanche center or guide service should be able to help you find those. There are also interactive online avalanche courses like https://kbyg.org/learn/ that can provide great background material for a Level 1 course. Going through an online program won’t teach you everything you need to know, but will set you up to much better follow and understand the firehose of information you’ll get in a Level 1 class.
It’s important to understand that a Companion Rescue course is not a one and done deal – If you are doing things right, you won’t get a chance to use your rescue skills very often and practicing realistic search, probe, and dig scenarios with partners is a must. Ideally, we should all recognize Companion Rescue training as being similar to CPR or WFR training and re-take the training every few years.
Anyone aware of a comparable system of evaluation in Europe? the most i have seen are ad-hoc courses run by guides.
Hi Alec – AIARE offers some courses in France and Iceland, all taught in english. Check out the providers list on the AIARE webiste: https://aiare.info/providers_list.php
Alec- It really depends on the region… For example here in Scandinavia Sweden and Finland have a shared system of standardised courses based heavily on canadian (CAA) curriculum.
Whereas Norway is still a bit of a mess, with some guides offerering AST courses (Canadian certification), some AIARE courses, some NF (Norwegian attempt at a curriculum) and a lot of ad hoc. courses (which can either be great, or sub-par depending on the instructor and what they choose to emphasize in their course curriculum).
Not so sure of what standards exist down in the alps, but suspect there is quite a bit of variety from country to country.
This is a great summary and overview. One of Julia’s major points is one I would like to reinforce and build on. She offers great counsel on how to prepare for one’s first avalanche course. I’d take it a step or two further. I’ve taught avalanche courses since 2008. There is a clear correlation between how much a student gets out of the course and how much that student has travelled in the backcountry prior to the course (to a point… People with decades of bc experience often get less out of avalanche education, for a variety of reasons). Yes, I am recommending that you ski in the backcountry before beginning your avalanche education. Perhaps extensively. As Julia notes, being familiar with backcountry ski technique and equipment is a minimum requirement. Further, there is a great deal in an avalanche course that only makes sense with some contextual understanding. You can only fully grasp that context with actual backcountry experience. What you learn on a handful of well-lead tours is invaluable in your first avalanche course. See my last main site blog post for further elaboration on this topic. Of course, this is a bit of a “catch 22”, especially in the current culture. Many ski touring group “leaders” will not accompany others into the backcountry if those newcomers have not taken an avalanche course. I personally hope that this seemingly well-intentioned convention relaxes. I recommend caution in relying on formal education as a partner vetting procedure, whether that partner is the leader or the newcomer.
Jed, I’m intrigued by your comment that “People with decades of bc experience often get less out of avalanche education, for a variety of reasons.” Could you elaborate on this?
Kyle J, below, basically nailed it. Everyone comes out of an avalanche course underwhelmed in some way or another. The inherent uncertainty in this environment is so tough to swallow…
The caption in the last photo gave me an idea “snowpits all day long”. That should be a supplementary option that avalanche course providers offer. Especially since the pro/rec split the snowpit work in level 2 is rather watered down. Could be an option to strengthen level 1 skills especially for a pre-level 2 class.
Thanks for the clarification! I’ve been considering taking my first avy course after a couple years of low-angle exploring, but have always been baffled by the variety of options.
I’m not Jed, obviously, but in many cases, those who have decades of experience have either built a decision making framework, know snow science, and have organically formed a healthy risk assessment method for themselves over their years of experience… Or… They have done the opposite and don’t want to hear their “experience” and challenged or have their habits altered… Old dog, new tricks, either way.
I’m going to disagree with you RollyPolly–not in the spirit of anonymous internet trolling, but hopefully to keep this discussion going as I think it’s a good one. I’d rather have this discussion on the skin-track with you but I’m 9-5ing it this week while the real experts are out doing…
I am not an avalanche expert. I guess I know just enough to know I really don’t know. But what I do think is that snow pits seem to be a North American preoccupation. Has any European skier ever (EVER?!?!?)…in all the history of Chamonix or La Grave skiing…actually dug a snow pit before dropping into their line like I used to see routinely in Alaska or occasionally here in the PNW? Of course pits have their place, and if recreational skiers want to spend time doing them I’m not going to discourage them. But just because my crazy neighbor bought a weather station for his backyard, doesn’t mean I’m going to start trusting his advice and stop listening to a trained meteorologist.
My personal opinion is that digging pits got lumped into early formalized avalanche training and somehow became a thing that the lay-person started to believe they needed to do to travel in avalanche terrain. I emphatically welcomed the split between the recreational and professional tracks because I felt not enough time was spent in Avy 1 and 2 on terrain selection–which I argue is the single most important skill to master as a recreational skier.
Stability tests make sense to me if you’re in a new zone that doesn’t have a decent forecasting center or weather stations, but in this day and age that’s pretty rare. Additionally, IMO snow pits are pretty janky (def: subjective and prone to human error and misinterpretation–for you non-millennials). I know there are lots of snow gurus who can replicate their tests every time, but that’s why they are the pros and most of us are not. There is a reason why there is a big push by snow science to come up with a better way to take human error out of stability testing (because it’s janky). Most of us suck at it. I mean if you told a modern scientist who didn’t know anything about avalanches that you go out in the woods, dig a pit in the snow, and then tap on it (“tap, tap, tap with my wrist, then tap, tap, tap with my elbow…”) to get the data you then trusted your life to, they’d shake their head and walk quickly away from you.
There’s got to be a better way, and for now I think hand pits, ski cuts, and a lot of thought on terrain analysis are a better way to spend my time when I’m recreationally skiing. With that said, the snow scientists, forecasters, and (sometimes) guides need to do this–but only when also carefully analyzing the weather, wind, precip, and the trends of the blessed Snow-Spirits. I think that’s why the split was made and I’m happy the snow educators in the US are going this way.
I agree with this. I took the AIARE courses before the rec/pro split, and it seemed to me that not enough time was spent on snow, especially in the L1. Terrain selection is arguably the most important aspect to consider when recreating in avy terrain (Bruce Tremper seems to agree, as well as many knowlegdeable guides and avy instructors i have come to know during these past few years), yet it seems that besides covering basics, not enough time is spent actually interpreting terrain and choices during avy courses. Down here in Chile, there are no public avy bulletins, and most people rely on either a very conservative approach, or a “ballsy” decision making process.
My philosophy, given the mostly maritime snowpack around the mountains near Santiago, is to focus on pits in the early season, and maybe after significant snowfall (thanks to climate change, this is becoming very rare round these parts). I used to be one of those persons who dug pits before skiing a run, almost religiously. Now I focus more on recognizing and interpreting flags of inestability, and rarely dig snowpits to help my decision making on site. I value pits as a way of gathering information, rather that a bomb-proof way to make the call to ski a line.
I would be keen on hearing more on other takes on this subject, especially from folks who ski and board in places without an avy bulletin.
Great discussion here you all! I think we can also look at the bigger picture of snow pits in the context of relevant observations. I agree that a recreationalist (or pro for that matter) who goes out an haphazardly digs a pit in the snow looking for crystal ball info will leave misinformed and with potentially life threatening information. One of the arts and processes coming out of an avalanche course is being able to make relevant snowpack observations. This is combined with the long list of other factors you’re taking into consideration. Ie: what is the avalanche bulletin saying for the day, what wx observations are you making, what are your groups goals, how much uncertainty do you have, and ultimately how does that inform your terrain and travel choices. Back to a point, snowpits are not always relevant, and I think that’s where people get into trouble. Have a reason to do what you’re doing, and if you are confused or have uncertainty about what that is, increase your margin of safety from avalanche terrain.
A basic rule I use (and teach) is that I NEVER gain green light information from a snow pit, but I’ll certainly get red light information. It’s one more data point that I’m logging throughout a day (and a season) of information that pertains to my choices out there.
These are some examples of processes that can be gained from quality Avalanche educators. How to make and recognize pertinent information in a highly dynamic environment.
We haven’t even talked about groups of humans yet…?
As a outsider / newbie looking in on avalanche education, I’ve also wondered about this emphasis on snow pits. How is one 6′ cube an accurate representation of the thousands of cubic feet of snow one plans skiing across?
I don’t think AAA and AIARE could have done a better at making things more confusing and convoluted for the new backcountry enthusiast. Unsationable egos/small reproductive organs in these organizations has made avalanche education into a mess that only pros can figure out…
I agree that snow pits can be confusing at first, however, they still have their place in decision making. If I see skier triggered avalanches in my backcountry area, I like to dig a pit and perform some of the snow tests in order to calibrate myself to what a test might “feel” like when the probability of a skier triggering a slide is near 100%. Ideally, I would dig a pit right on the crown, however, proximity and safety don’t always allow this. I use my “calibrated” sense to test snowpack on days I have more concern about avalanche risk. I never use a test by itself to greenlight a run, however, I will certainly redlight a run from a single test. In that regard, I think a single 6′ pit can be an accurate representation of thousands of CF of snowpack – if you observe an active layer in a well performed snow test, it’s likely you will observe this layer elsewhere. Of course, when I say “more concern,” I’m talking about those days where signs of risk are not screaming in your face yet something still seems off – I like to tell myself this comes from years of experience in the backcountry.
On another note, a common mistake I see folks make while skiing is estimating the slope – both over and under estimating. As someone who periodically does land surveying (civil engineer), I expected to have a good eye for slope determination. I was wrong! When I first started skiing in the backcountry I noticed I often underestimated the slope when the truth came out from a slope meter. I started carrying a slope meter to calibrate myself to reading slope angles. The method that works for me is that I estimate the slope without measuring. I say it out loud to others or write it down. Then I measure. If I’m significantly off, I try to remember something about that slope – perhaps how much lean I need to make to line up my horizontally extended arms parallel to the surface…