A new user-carried device that actively pumps fresh air from the surrounding snowpack to a buried avalanche victim has been shown in a clinical trial to significantly prolong the breathable air supply, creating a much larger window for a successful rescue. The device, developed by the Norwegian company Safeback, addresses the primary cause of death in avalanches—asphyxiation—by continuously replacing the limited air available in a snow burial with oxygen drawn from the porous snow itself.
Avalanche fatalities are overwhelmingly a race against time, with asphyxiation accounting for approximately two-thirds of all deaths. Survival chances plummet dramatically after about 35 minutes of burial as the victim depletes the oxygen in the small air pocket around their face and succumbs to toxic levels of their own exhaled carbon dioxide. The Safeback SBX system was created to directly combat this deadly timeline. By actively supplying fresh air, the technology sustains a victim well beyond this critical threshold, a crucial advantage when rescue can be delayed by hazardous conditions or the remoteness of the location.
A Novel Approach to a Lethal Problem
Standard avalanche safety equipment is focused on two goals: avoiding burial and enabling rescue. Avalanche airbags are designed to help a skier or snowmobiler “float” on top of the moving debris to prevent or minimize burial depth. Meanwhile, the essential trio of a beacon, shovel, and probe are tools for companions to locate and excavate a buried individual. While these tools are critical, a gap remained for situations where a person is fully buried and cannot be reached immediately. Past technologies, such as snorkel-like devices that attempted to separate inhaled and exhaled air, saw limited adoption and did not actively supply fresh air.
The SBX system addresses the direct mechanism of death in these scenarios. Once a person is buried, the heat from their body and breath can melt the snow around their face, which then refreezes into an impermeable “ice mask,” sealing them off from any available air. Even without an ice mask, the limited air pocket is quickly fouled with carbon dioxide. The new device works to prevent both of these outcomes by maintaining a constant flow of fresh air that keeps oxygen levels stable and prevents CO2 from accumulating to lethal concentrations.
The Mechanics of Breathing Under Snow
The Safeback SBX is integrated into a backpack and is activated manually by pulling a T-shaped handle, similar to an avalanche airbag. The handle powers an electric fan that begins drawing air from the snowpack. Contrary to intuition, snow is highly porous and contains a significant amount of air. The SBX leverages this by pulling that trapped air through an intake in the backpack and feeding it out through hoses that are routed in the shoulder straps, releasing it near the user’s nose and mouth.
This active pumping mechanism is the key innovation. It is designed to deliver a continuous supply of oxygenated air, which in turn flushes away the exhaled carbon dioxide. This constant replacement of the air in the breathing pocket is what extends the survival time long after the initial air supply would have become toxic. The system is designed to provide a lifeline that can sustain a victim far beyond the point where brain damage and death would typically occur, fundamentally altering the calculus of a rescue operation.
Rigorous Testing Under Realistic Conditions
To validate the device’s efficacy, its creators partnered with Eurac Research for an independent clinical trial. Led by physician and researcher Giacomo Strapazzon, an international team conducted an experimental study that faced significant logistical and ethical hurdles, as it involved intentionally burying human volunteers under snow to simulate real-world avalanche conditions.
Study Design
The research team recruited experienced ski mountaineers, with a balanced representation of men and women between the ages of 23 and 54, to serve as test subjects. This demographic was chosen to reflect the typical user of such backcountry equipment. During the trials, each volunteer was carefully buried in the snow while equipped with the SBX device and a suite of physiological sensors that monitored their vital signs in real time. This allowed the researchers to collect objective data on the device’s performance while ensuring the absolute safety of the participants.
Key Physiological Results
The data from the clinical trial provided strong evidence of the system’s effectiveness. Most notably, the device successfully maintained the subjects’ blood oxygen saturation—a measure of the amount of oxygen carried by red blood cells—above 80% throughout the entire test period. A healthy reading is typically 95–100%, and a drop below 90% is a cause for concern. By keeping the level above 80%, the device proved its ability to stave off severe hypoxia, the oxygen deprivation that leads to loss of consciousness and death. The results represent a paradigm shift, moving the technology from a promising concept to a life-saving tool validated by the gold standard of evidence-based medicine.
Redefining the Avalanche Survival Curve
The established avalanche survival curve, known to all backcountry travelers, is unforgiving. While the survival rate is relatively high for those rescued within the first 15 minutes, it drops precipitously afterward. By the 35-minute mark, most buried victims who have not been rescued are already deceased. The Safeback SBX is engineered to flatten that deadly curve. By providing a breathable atmosphere for a prolonged period, it can turn what would have been a body recovery into a live rescue.
This extension is critically important because rescue is often not immediate. A companion rescue may be impossible if other group members are also caught, injured, or if the remaining debris field is too unstable to enter safely. Professional rescue teams may be minutes or even hours away. The SBX is designed to bridge that gap, supplying the one thing a victim needs more than anything else: time. It provides a viable chance for survival in scenarios that were previously considered hopeless.
Integrating New Technology into Backcountry Safety
Experts and developers are clear that the Safeback SBX is another layer in a comprehensive safety system, not a silver bullet that allows for riskier behavior. The foundational principles of avalanche safety remain unchanged: education, risk assessment, and conservative decision-making are the most effective ways to survive a day in the backcountry. When prevention fails, the essential tools for companion rescue—a beacon, shovel, and probe—are still mandatory.
The SBX and avalanche airbags are complementary technologies that address different phases of an incident. An airbag aims to prevent the burial, while the SBX aims to make a burial survivable. As this new technology becomes more widely available, the path forward will involve educating users on how it integrates with their existing tools and practices. The ultimate goal is to add another powerful tool to the kit that gives backcountry enthusiasts the best possible chance of coming home safe.
