Avalanche Rescue? There's NOT an app for that...

How to survive an avalanche? Don't get into one.

Interview with Jill Fredston

(Eptstein, 2021)

Illustration by Slate Magazine 2021

https://slate.com/human-interest/2021/04/how-to-survive-an-avalanche-tips-from-expert-jill-fredston.html

Out of bounds (an article from ABC News, Australia (2021 link))

Avalanches? In Australia? They are real and they can be deadly. But a group of back-country adventurers is trying to keep skiers, boarders and bushwalkers safe when they head out into the alpine wilderness. 

The Canadian Avalanche Centre "Avalanche Canada" gear recommendation:  https://www.avalanche.ca/gear

The BCA Tracker2 Avalanche Transceiver on epictv.com

"The Tracker2 avalanche transceiver is used to quickly locate avalanche victims and is required equipment for ski touring and backcountry skiing. The Tracker 2 is one of the fastest and most precise pinpointing transceivers on the market. It features triple receive antenna, instantaneous real-time display, and the same easy-to-use interface as the Tracker DTS. A mechanical search/transmit switch is super intuitive making it easy to use right “out of the box.” Includes multiple burial indicator lights and Special Mode.

Galileo-LawinenFon turns a smartphone into an avalanche transceiver (2014 link).

"(in 2013...) the Canadian Avalanche Centre (CAC) issued a warning about the dangers of relying on smartphone apps that were being marketed as economical alternatives to avalanche transceivers. But a new smartphone app and add-on hardware component could provide an alternative that is not only cheaper than dedicated avalanche transceivers, but also provides additional functionality.

On misguided attempts to replace avalanche rescue beacons with one of a growing number of smartphone apps (2013, link).

"Some people may be tempted to save a couple hundred dollars on an avalanche beacon and opt for one of several apps on the market. The Canadian Avalanche Centre does not recommend using these apps for actual avalanche incidents, however. It assessed three European apps – iSis Intelligent (Mountain) Rescue System, Snøg Avalanche Buddy and SnoWhere – before coming to the conclusion that they are unreliable and promote a false sense of security.

Avalanche airbags now offer wireless remote activation (2010, link).

"ABS has introduced a world-first - a remote, networked electronic system which allows airbag inflation to be triggered by other members of a skiing party, allowing them to help each other in an emergency.

This tracking system promises faster help for avalanche victims (2007, link).

"A new positioning system which will use Galileo, the future European global positioning satellite system, may prove to be a life saver for avalanche victims.

The Avalanche case

Similar case: 6 skiers survive backcountry avalanche near Whistler: Report by CBC (link).

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From Bill Buxton's "Sketching User Experiences" (Buxton, 2007).
This case sets up the issues for high-tech design, design that works 'in the wild', that works for real people in real situations and facilitates achieving their human goals.

Bill Buxton sets the scene with the avalanche responder case. It is an incident experienced by his good friend Saul Greenberg, Saul's wife, and three friends when skiing in high mountainous terrain in Canmore and Kananaskis Country, Alberta, Canada.

The group was traversing a valley slope when a lethal avalanche fell across their path. The three skiers in the middle of the group were caught in the slide. The lead (Saul's wife) and the last skier could only watch the disaster unfold as three of the following skiers were engulfed by the avalanche. One was simply knocked down, one was buried up to her shoulders, and the last, Saul, was missing.

Let's pause the story at this point.

Avalanche and path of ski group collide

What is the normal procedure when backwoods skiing where there is a risk of avalanches? 

First, you go equiped with specialised equipment: radio transceivers, probes, and collapsible shovels. But more than just the technology; it requires know-how, knowledge, practices, shared practices, skills, situational analysis, stuff you learn and some stuff you have to make up as you go.

When skiing across an avalanche risk slope or area, you work one of a number of simple systems depending on the severity of the risk. Normal procedure for traversal is to spread out and post lookouts at either end, and traverse one-by-one. If a group gets caught in a slide and some survive (most don't) what do you do?

1. Someone goes lookout (you may be hit by another avalanche). 
2. Reverse triage; rescue the most able first (and they may be able to assist later). 
3. Rescuers go to the approximate location of buried victims, judge if carried onwards, then guide using transceiver. 
4. Use an avalanche probe to locate the body. 
5. When the victim is felt you start to dig and dig. 

The story continues...

"Steve, who was higher, checked up on Shane (who was okay), then immediately went to his wife. He freed her arms, and made sure her head was above the snow." 

"Judy went directly to the spot where she had last seen Saul... In order to pinpoint Saul's location, Judy used her avalanche transceiver. ... Using this, she walked a particular pattern on the snow, employing the loudness of a ping (determined by the strength of a signal from Saul's transceiver) to guide her closer and closer to a spot above where he was buried." 

"Judy started digging. Steve arrived and asked if she had verified the spot with her probe, she hadn’t. Judy was confident that she had the right spot, but by this time she had had to dig so deep that her confidence was wavering…"

Saul had tried to ski his way out of it but got caught in the hollow (avalanches can travel at up to 200km/hr whereas 40km/hr is really fast for a skier).

Saul got caught in the trough, a ‘feature trap’, that also meant he was buried deep! But he had cupped his hand over his mouth and nose, preserving a small air space so he could breathe.

He waited, buried under the weight of the snow, and tried to relax. He had to trust in his partners, their training, his and their gear.

None of the participants had ever been in this situation before. Time elapsed from avalanche impact to rescue was about 10 minutes. Under the conditions, after 20 minutes he would have been dead.

(Buxton, 2007) 

Question: After the 'who'; what saved Saul?

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Instructional videos by Canadian Forest Rescue SEE SAFETY (http://www.fsavalanche.org/).

Design related material:
Source: Buxton, B. (2007) Sketching User Experiences: Getting the Design Right and the Right Design, San Francisco, Morgan Kaufmann. (Video examples for the book can be found at the publisher's companion site)
Bill's homepage (billbuxton.com)

Cray was a legend in computers and said...

Selected quotes: 

From around 5' mark 
"So, let me tell you a little bit, a few of the problems, that ah, and the solutions that I see in building large computers.
First of all... I think that building large computers should be done with the fewest possible people.
One is perfect, but you can't quite work with one.
So.. the next best thing is about 12."

"The reason you need 12 is you kind of need one person from each of the disciplines that are necessary.
You need a mechanical engineer to build the box that it'll go in.
You need an electrical engineer to put the circuit together.
You need a little bit of logic... and programmer here and there
And you need a secretary of course.
But not very many."

From around 6' mark 
[On the projects I've been involved in]
"the number of people involved has been pretty much constant.
... from a low of 25 to a high of 40.
[Small enough] that's a group where I can remember everybody's name, which I think is kind of important, but large enough enough so that we can in fact build large scientific computers."
...My current company has 25 people, it started 2 years ago, and I certainly wouldn't want any more, it's kind of crowded."
...Our current machine is far enough along that it's starting to run programs.
"A small group of people is kind of essential.
And ah, the extent to which I've been successful in building large machines I think that is one key thing.

From around 8' mark
"...and another key point, that's perhaps equally important is discipline.
If you work in a large corporation it's very hard to keep on one track for 4 or 5 years.
And 4 or 5 years is how long you need to keep on track to work on a project like that.
So continuity is, .. is another very very important thing.
And to develop the continuity I mean not only the scope of the organisation that's providing the money for you but also the continuity in the sense of people sticking around and finishing the job.
It's hard to design a computer if the person who designed it has left and has been replaced twice by somebody else."
So another characteristic, the people I'm working with today, my little elves, are all kind of old little elves, they've all been around since the early 50s or mid 50s.
...And that brings me to another important point that I think you'll appreciate and that hit me hard this year.
Because, we decided we were all getting too old and something should be done.


From around 9' mark
"...So we decided that we would hire 8 new people, fresh out of school, who didn't know a thing about computers.
They might know a little bit about electronics a little bit about physics maybe.
But ah, let's say three of them were college graduates, three of them from trade schools.
And we'd just sit 'em down and try to teach them about this huge complex computer that we were designing and see how far we'd get.
Well, the shocking thing was, it was only about three months, and they were doing so well at it,  that they were telling me about my design and what was wrong with it.
And by golly they were right.
These new kids were, were finding flaws in my logic design that I wouldn't have found myself.
And yet they had no experience prior to a few months of contact.
And I guess one of the things was that they were so unimpressed.
They had no idea, really, that this was supposed to be a big powerful machine.
And they were so unimpressed, that of course, you know, that they thought this was what everybody did that graduated from school.
[laughter]
And with an attitude like that, it's amazing, I guess maybe we are building simple computers.
..."

Reading an article and not sure how to write about it yourself?

- readings, precis, impact, application -

Prompting questions:

• What did I learn from reading this article?
• What was the intention of the authors?
• Who is the audience for the article?
• How could I use the article?

Readings are often difficult to understand or alternatively, to interpret and make sense of. I've often read a paper and said to myself "so what", "it's obvious", "what's the appeal of this stuff?" Sometimes I've been confused, overwhelmed with detail or just don't get the point. I've also read papers that have set off ideas, recalled past experiences, given an outlook that changes something I thought I knew well but now see in a different light.

Writing a precis of a paper turns the whole process back on itself somewhat; I go from being the reader of the paper to being a writer. Writing about a paper demands something of me, not just my impression of the paper and the information contained within, but how I felt about the ideas expressed, how I saw them applied, and reflected on their wider impact.

Written comments on a reading need to be succinct (if you go past a page then perhaps you should be writing a new paper?), and impact-full. Get to the point, don't just summarise, criticise! Refer to other works in a meaningful way (counter examples, supporting examples), and reflect on the bigger picture. If there are implications for practitioners and practice then state them, particularly if they are personal, affecting you.

When criticising a paper you should always attempt to be fair. Criticise it on its terms, not because it doesn't address certain areas that you think are more important; there may be good reasons for a paper's omissions: limited space, out of scope, irrelevance.

Finally, keep to the limits, wordcounts shouldn't be treated as "targets". If you can say less then say less; less is often more. It takes time to distill your comments and the result is often unexpected, but often in good ways.

Pointers

• Pick out some aspect of interest from the paper
• Comment on it (there are no wrong answers, it's just an opinion)
• Link it back to design processes.
• And consider linking your argument with pertinent external readings.

Try not go off on a tangent or indulge yourself in a flight of fancy. But if the paper sets off your creative side then explain your logic:

"The reading included a discussion of X which made me consider Y (not in the reading) because...".

Relate it back to the course; to continue:

"...but both X & Y are pertinent to Z which we have seen is a fundamental to the work of analysis, design and development"

The following rubric (a protocol or procedure) on assessing a written work may also be useful...
Audience: Who is the reading directed at? Is a question formulated, is it interesting and clearly put? Did the author clearly explain the purpose of the article?
Structure: Are the thoughts/agruments connected? Is there a logic to the presentation of ideas? Is theory utilised? If so is it treated critically or uncritically (just applied)? Do the authors anticipate and respond to counter-arguments?
Style of evidence: Does the work offer conjecture and possibilities based on the literature? Does the work offer empirical matter? Are assumptions stated? Is a philosophical foundation indicated?
Validity: How is the work positioned such that we understand how to test the extent of its claims, justification, rigour.
Rhetoric: Is the article persuasive? Are the findings, discussion and conclusions convincing? Does the work present implications and impacts? Are there behavioural, managerial, organisational consequences?


Further reading (about reading...no irony in that is there?)

• R. Subramanyam. Art of reading a journal article: Methodically and effectively. Journal of Oral and Maxillofacial Pathology : JOMFP, 17(1):65–70, Jan-Apr 2013. (link)
• E. Pain. How to (seriously) read a scientific paper. Science, March 2016. Available online at http://www.sciencemag.org/careers/2016/03/how-seriously-read-scientific-paper (Accessed: 29 November 2017). (link)
• A. Ruben. How to read a scientific paper. Science, January 2016. Available online at http://www.sciencemag.org/careers/2016/01/how-read-scientific-paper (Accessed: 29 November 2017).

Podcast media - two ideas (music, cover art)

What is podcast cover art?

Podcast cover art is a direct descendent of the traditional record cover. Think of the printed cardboard sleeve that contained old vinyl records (aka phonograph record, gramophone record, disc record, long-playing record, or just 'record'). The LP record had a diameter of 12' so the sleeve it came in was a 12' square. Sleeves for singles were typically 7' square.

(e.g. Example_Instagram_Format_Post.pptx)

You will create a cover art image in PowerPoint or other graphic design application. The image must be: 

• A SQUARE artwork of size (minimum) 1400 x 1400 pixels to (a maximum) of 3000 x 3000 pixels, 72 dpi that can be exported to JPEG or PNG file.

If third party media is used then you must identify the source (file, location etc), credit the creator and/or owner of the copyright, and ensure you in turn have a valid copyright license to use the media or derivatives.

What is intro/outro music?

An intro/outro is typically a 5 to 15 second audio segment (a cut) that acts as a musical punctuation for media. As creators ourselves we need to understand copyright, royalty, licences, and permissions. Especially as we publish our own work under a Creative Commons licence.  Creative Commons enables use to licence - use and share all kinds of digital media legally.

You will search for and select one music media file (mp3) available under a CC licence or similar no-fee royalty free licence.

Further reading

Creative Commons licence - using and sharing media legally