09/28/2025
If you need to probe for crevasses at a regroup, it’s probably not the safest place to stop.
If you probe a crevasse, you’re lucky you didn’t already fall in. If you’re not on a crevasse, there could still be a weak bridge less than a metre away where part of your group might stop. If you have enough uncertainty that you feel like you need to probe, you should already be roped up (not very fun to ski down), or you shouldn’t be there.
To figure out a good place to regroup on a glacier, you need to have a good understanding of how glaciers flow, where crevasses form, places bridges are likely to be weak, and where they’re likely to be strong. On a run with big sags such as the one shown in the photos, it’s also helpful to look at the glacier from the bottom before dropping in, as it’s much more difficult to see crevasses while you’re on the glacier skiing down.
When you drop in, you need to be alert, scanning scan left and right as you’re skiing to look for sags, because they’re much more difficult to see looking straight ahead due to the shadows. You can then build a mental map of the crevasses and decide where to stop.
In photos 1 & 2 you can see our group stopped below the bergschrund and immediately above the two big sags. This meant our group could cross the sags slowly, so there was less chance of someone crashing and breaking a bridge, or losing their skis and bootpacking on the bridge.
After another 10 turns I couldn’t find another place I felt comfortable regrouping, so I ran it out into the flats.
You can read more in The Art of Glacier Travel Handbook. It’s available as a pay-what-you-want download, making it accessible to everyone regardless of budget. A paperback version is also available at .outdoors or Amazon.
