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Show snow and want to dig after that," Kyle Gilbert says. Basically, whenever Daddy says "search," the dog knows someone is buried somewhere, and if it finds the person it will get a reward. The hole is actually quite roomy. I can't sit up, but I can bend my knees or scratch myself if I need to. If I was caught in a real avalanche, this wouldn't be the case. There would be snow everywhere — in my pants, in my throat, in my eyelids — and I would probably have some broken bones. I would not be having an enjoyable time. I decide to think about this later, when I'm not buried in a dog hole. I try to remember what the Gilberts told me before they gave me a radio and two jerky treats and buried me in snow. I'm supposed to make Bridger work for the treat, hide it in my hands and keep it away from him for a bit. They want him to go as far into the hole as possible. Once I give him the first treat, Kyle will pull him out. Then I'm to pull the second treat out of my pocket, and he'll let Bridger back in so we can do the whole dance over again. Any breed of dog can be an avalanche dog, and while German Shepherds have long been a popular choice for working dogs of all types, "you're starting to see fewer and fewer Shepherds" on the slopes. This is mostly because of their size: they're harder to carry around to get to tricky terrain. Handlers look more at the personality of the dog. They have to have a lot of energy, drive, and curiosity. Because of this, multiple dogs from the same litter will often be chosen as avalanche dogs. Solitude's other full-time dog, Rio — who is roughly a third of Bridger's size — has siblings that work at Alta. Avalanche dogs typically work in-bounds, Kyle Gilbert says, and get taken into the backcountry mainly as backup in case technology malfunctions. Most backcountry travelers have an avalanche beacon. The dogs are trained to do "bark alerts" — barking when they find a person they can't get to, or a person who's unconscious. Most days Bridger just hangs out. Every morning, after he hikes in with Kyle, he rides the lift up to the top-shack, where he snoozes in a kennel. The patrollers want to keep him energized in case something happens. He doesn't train every day, but they make sure to do a few training exercises a week. These range from simple "article drills," where they bury an article of clothing, to full-scale mock avalanches. Mock avalanche drills are where the advantages of working with dogs become apparent. During last year's drill, there were around forty people out on the slide path working with the dogs, and there were five people buried in various places. Not only did the dogs not get confused, Heidi Gilbert says, they came in first and third place against patrollers using beacons and probes. It's starting to get cold in this hole. I thought I had dressed adequately, but after io minutes it's become obvious that I failed. My jacket doesn't even appear to be waterproof. I can barely hear the sound of a female voice seeping in through the snow. It must be Heidi — she sounds muffled and far away, and I can't hear what she's saying or who she's talking to. The low-registered voices of the men don't carry that far. Suddenly everything falls quiet, and then I hear a frantic digging. I keep quiet for some reason — I guess I don't want to make it too easy for Bridger. Snow starts to seep through the cracks into the hole. Then suddenly there's sunlight and a big black nose, and then there's a 95-pound Deutscher Schaferhund in the hole with me trying to get at my jerky treat. I realize at this moment that I used to be absolutely terrified of German Shepherds, which makes me laugh, becaus now I want one. After I get out of the hole, I play with Bridger a, little bit. I tell him, "Dude, you saved my life!" but he doesn't seem to care. All he cares about is jerky treats and belly rubs. But I don't care that he doesn't care, because he's a dog, and he's not supposed to. He just wants to play. m r. |