Avalanche Radars for Road Protection on Arlberg/Austria

Since 1994, two pulsed Doppler radars on Arlberg/Alpe Rauz have been in use for detecting naturally released as well as artificially triggered snow avalanches, threatening road sections and buildings in their runout zones. The purposes are verification of trigger success (i.e. reduction of pending snow masses) as well as safety improvement for road clearing personnel, entering dangerous zones only after avalanche occurence. In addition, a data base on avalanche dynamic properties has been built and is steadily being extended. Analysis of this data results in planning figures for runout zone sizing and protection work design. A third, transportable avalanche radar has been developed for the Institute of Avalanche and Torrent Research (Innsbruck), to being used for avalanche dynamics measurements. Further three avalanche detection/verification radars are on the way being developed for deployment in the Arlberg area in 2003/2004 (for improving road safety).