My career of traveling over the snow, for pleasure and work, has given me the most enjoyable memories of my life as well as the most tragic. As an avalanche forecaster I predict avalanches, a difficult, and at times seemingly impossible task. Avalanches are beautiful, raw and powerful, and over three decades they revealed lessons, not just about snow, but … Read More
Restless Optimism, Western Migration, and Mineral Development in and Around the Absaroka Beartooth Wilderness
Excerpt: Americans are a restless lot. We are a people who seemingly are never content. We’ve pushed and prodded at the edges of civilized comfort, pushing the “frontier” ever westward over the 242 years of our national identity. Similarly, Americans have been characterized as optimist. Our history is chocked full of American icons pioneering new lands, opportunities, and technologies as … Read More
Three Fires
Excerpt: July 3, 1994 We marched up the dry ridge in the 104 degree heat, with pulaskis in hand, excavating the burned stumps and flaming logs, to extinguish the last of the heat. Gloves off. Test the heat of the stump hole with the sensitive back of your hand. Ash floats up around me with every step. Kirsten stops, her … Read More
Laced by Glaciers
Photo: Elizabeth Rose; Forthcoming essays include: Geology – Ennis Geraghty Glaciers – Jonathan Marquis Water and Healthy rivers – Michael Fiebig How Mountains formed a Mountaineer – Tom Turiano Ecological History … Read More