When Design Meets Disaster: An Avalanche Survival Story and the Power of User Experience

How a well-designed transceiver and a cool head under pressure saved a life, illustrating the critical role of UX in real-world scenarios.

In "Sketching User Experiences," author Bill Buxton shares a gripping story about Saul Greenberg, a fellow researcher and avid mountaineer:

“This story is about Saul Greenberg, a professor at the University of Calgary and a leading researcher in human-computer interaction. Saul and the storyteller share a strong bond, not only because of their professional relationship but also due to their mutual love for mountains and outdoor activities. Saul, being an experienced mountaineer, once faced a life-threatening situation while skiing with his wife, Judy, and three other friends.

They were skiing in Canmore, Alberta, a terrain they were familiar with. Despite the considerable risk of avalanches that day, they decided to ski down a slope, spreading out to minimize the risk. Unfortunately, an avalanche occurred, burying Saul under almost two meters of snow. Two other members of the party were also caught but not fully buried. Judy and another friend, Steve, who were acting as lookouts, were not caught up in the slide.

Steve, who was positioned higher, went to assist the partially buried members, while Judy set out to find Saul. She did not immediately start digging but used her avalanche transceiver to pinpoint Saul's location. Avalanche transceivers are wireless collaborative PDAs with audio/visual user interfaces that help locate victims under the snow.

A transceiver is worn under your outer layer of clothing in order to minimize the risk of it being torn off by the force of an avalanche. The harness is a fundamental part of the design. The device works in one of two modes: transmit or receive. The default is that they are always in transmit mode. That is, normally, all of them should be transmitting a signal that can be picked up as an audible “ping” by a receiver. You want this as a default if you are buried, because the last thing that you want when caught by an avalanche is to be fumbling around with your transceiver. Snapping the waist strap into the device, which you have to do to wear it (left photo), automatically sets the device in the correct mode. That same connector has a fast-release mechanism. If someone is buried, the survivors undo the snap, and they are automatically in receive or search mode (right photo). Note that the device still is secured to the wearer by the yellow strap, in the event that the rescuers are hit by a secondary avalanche. All controls of the transceiver can be operated while wearing gloves (although I am not doing so in these photos).

Once the transceiver indicated the likely burial point, the usual procedure is to use an avalanche probe to confirm the exact location before starting to dig. However, Judy decided to skip the probing and started digging at the location indicated by her transceiver.

The probe is like a long thin tent pole. It is light, and collapses for easy portability (left photo). It has a cable running through the centre of the poles that enables it to be assembled very quickly. When assembled (right photo), it is pushed down into the avalanche debris, enabling the rescuer to probe for the victim.

Saul, realizing his predicament, tried to ski out of the avalanche, but ended up trapped at the base of the slope. Avalanches can travel up to 200 km/h, making it challenging to out-ski them. Because of the conditions and Saul's technique, he was able to ski down with the slide until he got trapped in a feature trap.

As the river of snow started to slow down and cover him, Saul did the most important thing in terms of staying alive: he cupped his hand over his nose, and mouth, making sure that he kept an air space within which he could breathe. Once buried, he went very Zen, and purged every effort to struggle or rescue himself. Struggle and fight is what you do on top of the snow. Underneath, you must wait. And wait. And have faith in your partners, their training, and everyone’s gear. In Saul’s case, this trust was well placed. Judy found him. The total time from the slide to rescue was about 10 minutes. That was good—after 20 minutes, he probably would have been dead.

An avalanche shovel appears to be just a conventional shovel. However, it has a few conflicting constraints on its design. First, it must be compact and light, since you need to carry it in your pack. On the other hand, it needs to have a blade strong enough to penetrate the very hard consolidated snow encountered in avalanche debris, and be large enough to let you dig quickly and efficiently.

In reflecting on this incident, it is clear that Saul's survival was not just a matter of luck. There was a combination of on-the-spot problem-solving, performance, training, procedure, and equipment that contributed to his rescue. The story highlights that the tools, such as the avalanche transceiver, would have been useless if they did not exist within a larger ecosystem.

The story concludes with the acknowledgement that technologies do not exist in a vacuum but in a social and physical context. It emphasizes the need for any design methodology to take full account of the relevant ecosystem, as technologies are increasingly finding themselves in diverse and specialized contexts. For instance, if Saul had been the only one with a transceiver, his outcome would likely have been different, regardless of how well the transceiver worked.”