Amer Sports Launch the Mountain Academy

Amer Sports, owners of ski brands Atomic and Salomon, have partnered to create the Mountain Academy, an online avalanche safety course that’s designed to be a supplement to traditional in-the-field courses. It’s a comprehensive online course to develop essential snow and mountain safety skills so you can make smarter decisions every time you go out. The site is due to launch in Fall 2015 but there is a small teaser you can test your skills with now. Visit either of the links below to get a glimpse of what’s to come.

Amer Sports created the Mountain Academy in collaboration with wePowder. The Mountain Academy brings together some of the world’s most elite mountain experts: official national authorities, top avalanche centres, mountain guides and athletes to offer in depth, online snow safety education.

Through a series of high quality videos, pictures, animations and self tests, Mountain Academy students will gain fundamental information introducing them to variance in the snowpack, identifying different types of avalanches, and gaining the basic information about rescue tools and techniques. The curriculum will be developed through partnerships with the top experts in avalanche education including: AIARE , the foremost avalanche curriculum organization running programs in South America, Europe and the US, UAC, NWAC and CAIC. Users are self tested as they go, reinforcing the information they have learned. Curriculum is accessible via direct payment, less than the cost of a lift ticket, or through purchasing qualified Atomic and Salomon product.

“It‘s a great online service that both Atomic and Salomon will be offering from fall 2015.” said Michael Schineis, President of Winter Sports Equipment at Amer Sports. “The Mountain Academy will help all powder and backcountry enthusiasts to make their skiing days more enjoyable, more fun and most importantly safer.”

“It’s great to see Atomic and Salomon come together to create this one of a kind program,” said Mike Adams, Amer Sports Americas vice president of winter sports equipment. “Pairing education with top products like this is an industry first and we’re excited to lead the charge.”

The Mountain Academy is built around two online modules. The first module helps skiers ride safely out of bounds. It explains the essentials about snow safety, equipment, the different dangers and how to avoid them. The Mountain Academy’s second module gives skiers information they need to ride deeper in the backcountry. It’s a continuation of module one (which is recommended for skiers to go through first), and provides more in depth information on types of snow, avalanche situations, different terrains and the gear skiers need when they’re participating in backcountry travel.

The goal of Mountain Academy is to make backcountry education accessible and affordable to everyone. Mountain Academy is not meant to replace avalanche, safety and gear training, but rather supplement it and direct participants to sign up for an in person course in their area.