Wednesday, March 26, 2014

Element Barryvox wins Gear of the Year award from Backcountry Skiing Canada

Every once in a while we're not above some shameless self-promotion!  It is nice to be recognized though, and we appreciate the work they put into running our products through their paces.  Check out the Element Barryvox Product Review here:  CLICK THIS LINK


Wednesday, March 5, 2014

Service Bulletin for Inspection of Mammut and Snowpulse Avalanche Airbags


This service bulletin has been updated.  New info can be found at THIS LINK.

 

As always, Mammut strongly recommends that all users must check all of their safety equipment before every use as part of their

regular equipment check.

 

Contact info:

The following contact should be used for questions or service on both Mammut and Snowpulse brand airbags that exhibit visible threads on the Ventouri connection, as shown in the link above:

In the USA: 
Mammut Sports Group, Inc
(800) 451-5127
info@mammutusa.com

In Canada:
Mountain Sports Distribution
(888) 987-7533
info@MountainSportsDistribution.com

Tuesday, March 4, 2014

Tech Tips: Creating a "mental map" during multiple burial searches

Recently, I had the opportunity to participate in a group training with Mammut Snow Safety technical rep Doug Workman where we spent a morning practicing some of the advanced functions of the Pulse Barryvox transceiver.  Generally, this beacon (as well as the new Barryvox S which replaced the Pulse in 2017) allows either single or multiple burial searches to be accomplished extremely quickly and easily.  However, when a searcher confronted with interference that prevents the marking function from working normally or a close proximity multiple burial which frequently involves signal overlap, as with any digital beacon things fall apart--when overlapping signals or interference is present, all digital beacons struggle to differentiate the signals. In such instances, as with any digital beacon, searchers need to recognize what is going on and revert to an alternate search strategy (i.e. micro strips, micro box or 3-circle) to conduct the search. All digital beacons struggle in these scenarios, the difficulty is to recognize what is happening and definitively knowing WHEN to revert to an alternate search strategy, versus when you can continue relying on the marking function.

Mammut Snow Safety Tech Rep Doug Workman demonstrating a Micro-Search Box. Photo: Steve Lloyd

One of the most fundamental things I took away from the session was the importance of the "mental map" that a searcher can use during a multiple burial search by integrating analog information into a typical digital search.  By "mental map", I mean that as you progress through a search, you can quickly and easily form a mental picture of not only how many burials you are dealing with but also where each of them is relative to each other.  Why is this important?  Because this "mental map" allows a searcher to see and react to signal overlap problems AS THEY HAPPEN, rather than realizing what's going on after a problem occurs.