Crevasse Rescue Course

The day starts at 9:00 am where you will go through a quick equip­ment check. Train­ing starts with a focus on the skills nec­es­sary for the prop­er use of an ice axe, trav­el­ing in bal­ance, self-belay, and self arrest. You also begin learn­ing about plac­ing var­i­ous types of snow pro­tec­tion for use in the con­struc­tion of snow anchors, as well as belay tech­niques. You will then focus on the skills required for safe and effi­cient glac­i­er trav­el includ­ing roped trav­el and self-res­cue (prus­sik­ing) tech­niques.

After learn­ing the prop­er tech­niques for trav­el­ing as a rope team, dis­cus­sions will focus on nav­i­ga­tion with the use of a map and com­pass. The remain­der of the day will focus on the group prac­tic­ing effec­tive snow anchors and bol­lards and then learn­ing to equal­ize them to cre­ate ​“bomber” anchors. You will put them to use as you learn the fun­da­men­tals of crevasse res­cue pul­ley sys­tems and then move on to more advanced pul­ley sys­tems. Your team will per­form a num­ber of team res­cues, time per­mit­ting, and a mul­ti­tude of real­is­tic crevasse fall sce­nar­ios will be addressed. You will con­clude the day with a dis­cus­sion of the moun­tain envi­ron­ment and meth­ods of eval­u­at­ing sub­jec­tive and objec­tive hazards.