Staff Editor’s Note: If you’re interested in learning more about traveling, and riding, safely in the backcountry, check out Sam Thackeray’sEssential Avalanche Awareness Guide here. The Inertia readers get a 100 percent discount with code WELCOME10. For a long time, the focus of avalanche education was very heavy on science. The idea was that if we could just teach people how to go out and dig pits, identify grain types and sizes, and do snowpack tests, they’d be able to go out there on their own and gather all this information that would help keep people safe.