"All you want is a yes or no answer to the question 'Is the slope safe?' Columnist Anna Quindlen has written, 'We are a nation raised on True or False tests.' As far as you can tell, most avalanche questions are answered with 'It depends.'" — Anna Quindlen via Jill Fredston Snowstruck: In the Grip of Avalanches
"The more intensely we want something, the more reasons we will likely find that make it okay." — Jill Fredston Snowstruck: In the Grip of Avalanches
"What we see often has more to do with what we have seen in the past or what we hope or expect to see than it does with what is staring us in the face." — Jill Fredston Snowstruck: In the Grip of Avalanches
"To treat your facts with imagination is one thing, to imagine your facts is another." — John Burroughs
"In the inner workings of his brain, he had tagged it a happy, rewarding place. (Ali: the opposite is also true)" — Jill Fredston Snowstruck: In the Grip of Avalanches
"The longer the time lag between taking a risk and feeling its consequences, the more likely we are to ignore the risk." — Jill Fredston Snowstruck: In the Grip of Avalanches
"Most avalanche accidents happen when the terrain is a red light, the snowpack is a red light, and the skies have cleared, with sparkling green-light weather that entices people into the mountains." — Jill Fredston Snowstruck: In the Grip of Avalanches
"Familiarity and accessibility, however, inflate the problem by making us complacent. The mountains don’t behave any differently just because they are close to town." — Jill Fredston Snowstruck: In the Grip of Avalanches
"But we’re destined to lose any waiting game with nature, which has infinitely more time than we do. Thirty years is nothing but a nap in the life of an avalanche path." — Jill Fredston Snowstruck: In the Grip of Avalanches
"Avalanches are like fish: they tend to run in schools." — Jill Fredston Snowstruck: In the Grip of Avalanches
"Like Silly Putty, snow can flow and bend into ribbons and folds, and it can also bounce or spring. But when yanked rather than gently stretched, Silly Putty will break. If snow is stressed too much or too rapidly, it also becomes brittle and ruptures into pieces." — Jill Fredston Snowstruck: In the Grip of Avalanches
