Avalanches involving people who need to be rescued in Italy have doubled in the past 25 years. There used to be around 30 people per year who had to be rescued according to AINEVA, which is a snow and avalanche monitoring service. But now the average number of avalanche rescues is around 60.
One of the most effective ways to find buried avalanche victims is with trained Avalanche dogs. The role of the dogs in Italian Alpine rescues is becoming essential. The dogs go through a rigorous training program and the trained dogs help the trainees.
A trained Avalanche dog can use its sense of smell to locate someone buried deep into the snow more accurately than any transponder device. Time is of the essence. The dogs can detect the human deep into the snow and notify the rescue teams where to dig. For those buried, the best chance of getting out alive is when found the first 10-15 minutes. If a person cannot be found within half an hour, most of the victims die of asphyxiation.
There are around 80 active Avalanche dogs in Italy.