There’s an argument to be made that there’s no place you would be more exposed to a random avalanche than in the Himalayas. The base camps set up for the different peaks throughout the region are often surrounded by hanging glaciers and overloaded snow fields. All it takes is for one of those slopes above to get loaded with the right amount of snow, and for the temperature to line up right for all that snow to come tumbling down in a deadly avalanche. It happened at Everest a few years ago.
A cameraman recently captured a large avalanche tumbling down a valley below a base camp in northern India around Jangskar near the region of Ladakh (both were once part of Tibet). Jangskar has several different names including Zanskar – the range where the avalanche tumbles from is known as the Zanskar Range. The peaks of this range average around 20,000 feet so it’s no slouch in terms of Himalayan ranges. As you can see, it also produces some giant avalanches.
