A skier in Alaska survived this avalanche using a Backcountry Access Float 30 avalanche airbag backpack. Airbag backpacks, tested听with much success听in Europe, allow a skier or snowboarder to deploy airbags听 from the pack using compressed air, thus decreasing their density and keeping them atop the snowpack in a slide. You can see the shadows and edges of the orange airbags in this helmet cam. This skier ended up on top of the debris, feet downhill.听
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–Christopher Van Tilburg, MD