Avi Savvy: Avalanche survivor takes safety course at Turner Mountain

Jon Jeresek stood in the snow pit he had dug to ground level on a 40-degree slope just off the jeep trail near the top of Turner Mountain. He took out his tool kit that included a collapsible measuring stick, paintbrush, thermometers, shovel, snow saw and an old phone card. Jeresek was showing me how to perform the extended column test, which provides one of several pieces of information about snow conditions that should be ran through what he calls the most powerful computer in the world, the brain, before going into the backcountry during the winter months.