Wasatch - WPG Explosive Avalanche Testing

All,

Last week, the helicopter skiing company in the Wasatch Range of Utah
was "avalanche stability testing" using explosives. They released a
Class 3 avalanche after 8am. The debris pile is in Cardiff Fork and it
only takes about an hour to get there. This avalanche could have
killed someone and it happened in a place that made the likelihood of
that outcome too high. Its almost unbelievable that this could have
been done so close to trail head. A picture is shown here

http://www.avalanche.org/~uac/Adviso...20cardiff2.JPG

and an extensive discussion of the situation can be found here

http://www.telemarktalk.com/phpBB/vi...=asc&sta rt=0

WPG is permitted to bomb backcountry slopes for the purpose of
determining stability. Their permit also requires 'WPG will make every
practical effort to assure that their explosive stability testing will
not endanger people using the area being tested.' But as far as I can
tell there is virtually no oversight of this activity.

This avalanche scared me, and I don't want to just let it go. So, with
the help of others at TTips, I wrote a letter that I am planning to use
as a petition. The purpose of the letter is to make the Wasatch a
safer place. It can be found at

http://www.xmission.com/~ceyre/WPG_Petition_Final.pdf

If you are willing to sign the petition and/or help get others to sign
it, there are instructions with the letter for how to return the
signatures. Your help would be greatly appreciated. Hopefully,
through this petition and the letters of many more people, we can make
it safer to ski in the Wasatch.

Cheers,

David Eyre