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Research: Five Things You Thought You Knew About Avalanches But Were Wrong

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I have been doing a bit of research for another story.

Along the way, I started researching avalanches. For no reason. No reason at all…

Anyway, I thought I would share the results of some of that.

Five Things You Thought You Knew About Avalanches But Were Wrong

1. Avalanches are not triggered by sound.

That is correct. It’s a plot point in many movies, but noise simply does not have enough force to trigger an avalanche.  I was more than a little surprised by this, though I should know by now Hollywood spins a good story, not necessary an accurate one.

2. Avalanches are seldom random.

Those sudden and inexplicable snow slides you see in the movies? Very unlikely. In 92% of all avalanche accidents, either the victim or someone in the victim’s party triggered the avalanche. So while a tree falling in the woods is enough to displace the snow pack, it is usually the force of skiers over the snow that causes the snow to break free and start falling down the mountain.

3. Avalanches are not fluffy

You’ve seen the images. The brilliant puff of white snow that hail the impending avalanche. Except in most cases, that isn’t what an avalanche looks like at all. They usually travel at approximately 80mph in one dense slab. They are powerful forces of nature that take down trees, boulders, and other debris with them.

4. Avalanches Don’t Start with a Bang but a “Whumph”

Avalanches tend to happen when there is more than one kind of snow on the ground. For example, an original layer of snow that is then covered by fresh snow. The fragile needle-like crystals connecting the new snow to the older snow can be easily broken. Even by the weight of a skier. The weight of the skier can have a ripple effect through the snow, and this can cause the upper layer of snow to collapse by as little as a millimeter. This collapse is often accompanied by an audible “whumph” of settling snow. This settling produces enough energy to shatter the fragile crystals and tends to propagate uphill, leading to a major release of the upper layer. The rest is up to gravity, friction, and the steepness of the mountain.

5. Avalanches Don’t Freeze You To Death

While cold is certainly a factor, most deaths from avalanches are caused by trauma and asphyxiation. Approximately 30% of people caught in an avalanche die from trauma. While you can sometimes swim through snow, once it comes to rest, it will be packed around the victim as hard as rock, squeezing the air out of their lungs. Victims of an avalanche who survive the trauma have a 90% chance of survival if they are rescued in 15 minutes. If they are freed in 30 minutes, the odds are down to 50%. In the event of a significant avalanche dropping more than 6 feet of snow, the odds of the victim surviving are almost zero.

I am not a skier, and I am definitely not a back country skier. After reading a lot of this research, I understand why it considered such a dangerous sport. Still, it does present some interesting “opportunities” for characters.

*evil author laugh*

Research: Food in Ancient Rome

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I have mentioned before that the backdrop for my fantasy story is grounded more in ancient Rome that more traditional medieval Europe.

One of the areas I spent some time researching was food. As it happens, the scale of food production would not achieve the same levels in ancient Rome in Europe again until the 18th century. So they were quite advanced on this. Here are a few other things I learned.

Meals

Most people, even slaves, ate three meals a day at similar times to modern breakfast, lunch and dinner. While originally lunch was their largest meal of the day, it would eventually move to supper.

Cooking

Cooking was considered an art, and particularly fine cooking was associated with tasty and unique sauces. It was not uncommon to find wine, oils, vinegar, herbs, spices, and meat or fish juices mixed together to create these sauces. Much of this is known because books were dedicated to these recipes.

Available Foods

  • Cereals – wheat, barley, oats, rye, and millet.
  • Fruits – Apples, figs, grapes, pears, plums, dates, cherries and peaches. The Romans knew how to dry these to preserve their shelf life.
  • Vegetables – Legumes, lentils and peas, were the most common, all of which provided an excellent source of protein and was frequently mixed into bread. Other vegetables included asparagus, mushroom, turnips, onions, cucumbers, artichokes, and lettuce.
  • Olives and Olive Oil – These were so important in ancient Rome that they had their own classification.
  • Meat – This was expensive in ancient Rome and was commonly prepared in small cuts or as sausages. Almost any sort of bird imaginable from quails and pheasants to ostriches and peacocks were served. Most meat we are familiar with today was also on the Roman aristocrat’s table, including pork, veal, mutton, goat, boar and deer.
  • Seafood – Fish was certainly a part of their diet, but supply was irregular. Preservation techniques kept it a useful addition of protein to the Roman diet, and fish and shellfish were even farmed on artificial ponds. Fish sauce (garum) was an extremely popular method of flavoring.
  • Spices – (literally means valuable exotic commodity) were a huge part of good cooking. No fewer than 142 different spices have been identified to date in ancient sources. Some were grown nearby, others imported. This was a huge and sprawling empire, and they were trading with India and Asia.
  • Wine – Wine was served with most meals, frequently watered and flavored with honey. Beer was not served in Rome, and was only found in the northern part of the Roman Empire.

Food Conservation

They were adept at food conservation, and mastered numerous techniques.

  • Fruit and Vegetables were picked in brine or vinegar or stored in honey, wine, or grape juice. Fruits were also dried.
  • Meat was salted, dried, smoked, cured, pickled and preserved in honey

This made sure they could feed their large population and allowed more specialization

Feeding the Poor

Maintaining a regular food supply was very important. There was actually a part of the Roman bureaucracy dedicated to overseeing the regular supply of foodstuffs. In addition, the Romans established a monthly quota of grain at a fixed reasonable price for citizens. Olive oil, pork and wine were also allocated to poorer citizens.

I was surprised doing the research how much closer the ancient Roman diet was to our modern diet than medieval Europe. Now, about clan water…