Avalanches are beautiful, majestic, and completely terrifying – this is a video all about the science of avalanches. Head to https://brilliant.org/veritasium to start your free 30day trial, and get 20% off an annual premium subscription.

A massive thank you to everyone at Whistler Blackcomb for making this shoot happen – Dane Gergovich, David Iles, Alastair Collis, Erin Taylor, and everyone else on the ski patrol team. Thank you for keeping us safe!

A massive thank you to Bruce Tremper, Niko Schirmer, and Mark Smiley for their expertise and help with this video. We are truly grateful for your time and expertise.

Check out Niko's channel here it's easily some of the best skiing content on YouTube.    / @nikolai_schirmer  

If you have any intention of going into the backcountry, you have to read Bruce’s book – Staying Alive in Avalanche Terrain. It’s the Bible for this stuff, and the book that inspired us to make this video.

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Special thanks to our Patreon supporters! Join the community to help us keep our videos free, forever: https://ve42.co/PatreonDE

Adam Foreman, Anton Ragin, Balkrishna Heroor, Bertrand Serlet, Bill Linder, Blake Byers, Burt Humburg, Chris Harper, Dave Kircher, David Johnston, Evgeny Skvortsov, Garrett Mueller, Gnare, gpoly, I. H., John H. Austin, Jr., john kiehl, Josh Hibschman, Juan Benet, KeyWestr, Kyi, Lee Redden, Marinus Kuivenhoven, Martin, Matthias Wrobel, Max Paladino, Meekay, meg noah, Michael Krugman, Orlando Bassotto, Paul Peijzel, Richard Sundvall, Sam Lutfi, Stephen Wilcox, Tj Steyn, Toni , TTST, Ubiquity Ventures, wolfee

If you’re looking for a molecular modeling kit, try Snatoms, a kit I invented where the atoms snap together magnetically https://ve42.co/SnatomsV

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References:
Tremper, B. (2001). Staying Alive in Avalanche Terrain. Mountaineers Books. https://ve42.co/Tremper2001
McClung, D. & Schaerer, P. (2006). The Avalanche Handbook. Mountaineers Books. https://ve42.co/McClung2006
Hopfinger, E. J. (1983). Snow Avalanche Motion and Related Phenomena. Annual Review of Fluid Mechanics. https://ve42.co/Hopfinger1983
Schweizer, J. et al. (2003). Snow avalanche formation. Reviews of Geophysics. https://ve42.co/Schweizer2003
Schweizer, J. et al. (2008). Review of spatial variability of snowpack properties and its importance for avalanche formation. Cold Regions Science and Technology. https://ve42.co/Schweizer2008
Jamieson, B. (2006). Formation of refrozen snowpack layers and their role in slab avalanche release. Reviews of Geophysics. https://ve42.co/Jamieson2006
Schweizer, J. et al. (2016). Avalance release 101. International Snow Science Workshop Proceeding. https://ve42.co/Schweizer2016
Schweizer, J. (2008). Snow avalanche formation and dynamics. Cold Regions Science and Technology. https://ve42.co/Schweizer20082

Images & Video:
Skiing and snowboarding footage by Niko Schirmer https://ve42.co/NikoYT
World's Biggest Avalanche (c)Thom Goddard/All Star Films Ltd 2015. Thank you to the Thom Goddard Channel for use https://ve42.co/ThomGoddard
Newspaper clippings via Newspapers.com – https://ve42.co/Newspapers
Video of a snow slab avalanche via Trottet, B. et al. (2022). Transition from subRayleigh anticrack to supershear crack propagation in snow avalanches. Nature Physics. https://ve42.co/Trottet2022
Remote Triggered Avalanche via Henry’s Avalanche Talk Remote Triggering of an Avalanche
WW1 images via Brugnara, Y. et al. (2016). December 1916: Deadly Wartime Weather. Geographica Bernensia https://ve42.co/Brugnara2016
Major Avalanches via Geomorphological Hazards https://ve42.co/MajorAvi
White Friday avalanche illustration via Avalanches WIllow https://ve42.co/WhiteFriday
White Friday aftermath via Lost In History https://ve42.co/AviGraves
Field mass on Marmolada via Austrian National Library https://ve42.co/AviMass
Yungay disaster via NOAA https://ve42.co/Yungay
Yungay aftermath via AMC Museum https://ve42.co/YungayAMC
Bruce Tremper Image via utavy https://ve42.co/BruceTPic
Snowpack via SnowStudies.org https://ve42.co/SnowStudies
Snowpack via Avalanche.org https://ve42.co/SnowPackAvi
Snow crystals via Reiweger, I. (2011). Failure of weak snow layers. ETH. https://ve42.co/Reiweger2011

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Directed by Petr Lebedev
Written by Petr Lebedev and Derek Muller
Edited by Peter Nelson (Additional editing by James Horsley)
Animated by Jakub Misiek, Fabio Albertelli, Alex Zepherin, and Alex Drakoulis
Additional Research by Gregor Čavloviċ
Filmed by Petr Lebedev and Ryan Regehr
FPV Drone by Mitch Winton
Produced by Petr Lebedev, Derek Muller, Han Evans, Giovanna Utichi, Rob Beasley Spence, Emily Taylor and Gregor Čavloviċ

Thumbnail by Ren Hurley and Peter Sheppard
Additional video/photos supplied by Getty Images and Pond5
Music from Epidemic Sound