Tuesday, 22 December, the Valmorel ski patrol used a RECCO detector to locate an off-piste skier buried under 1.5 meters of snow. At about midday the English skier and her brother triggered a slab avalanche on the Col des Mottets. An avalanche about 20 meters wide and 300 meters long swept both down. The avalanche buried the brother to his waist and his sister deeper. Neither skier carried avalanche rescue beacons; however the woman had RECCO reflectors in her ski boots. The father used his mobile phone to call rescuers.

(The R9 in use searching an avalanche debris pile from the air.)

The first ski patrollers reached the site and started to search with a rescue bacon and a RECCO detector. The RECCO signal was quickly detected and pinpointed. Rescuers uncovered the woman after a 20 to 30 minute burial. Suffering from mild hypothermia the woman was flown by helicopter to a nearby hospital in Moutiers where she is recovering. (via boardsportsource)

Don’t ever think that a Recco device replaces an avalanche beacon or transceiver in any way, but it does help in situations like the great example above.  Front of mountain use, where you get caught in unexpected conditions.  If ever in doubt, ride with a friend, and know your terrain/conditions.

This is one of the many pieces WERX designed and developed for First Acent

Spent this week in Hong Kong working on some new projects for some great new brands.  Very hot, humid, but a great change to the dry summer climate here. Hong Kong is in great place to do business, explore some of the trend shopping (more…)

Dave Hahn walks us through what’s great about his new down suit we designed to fit his needs, and make the ultimate down suit for climbing some of the highest peaks in the world. He dows all this while waiting his turn to make the trek (more…)

Headed off to Munich for the gigantic ISPO trade fair, since we didn’t have enough trade shows so far.  This is always a great chance to see what’s going on in the Europ market, as so many strong brands have yet to make it to the US market. (more…)

Werx Design has had to pleasure of working with some of the world’s best mountaineers over the past year, to design and develop some of the most technical and relevant apparel & outerwear for their missions up mountains. So far the (more…)

While recently on a development trip through Asia, took the opportunity to try and get some good shots other then product and samples. The first one here was taken as the factory day ended in Bangladesh, and 20,000 people were about to (more…)