building a quinzhee snow survival shelter part 1 of 2

In this video I will build a quinzhee, a snow survival shelter to protect you in harsh winter conditions. It is basically a pile of settled and optionally compressed snow that you hollow out / excavate to make a space to provide shelter and protection from the elements outside. I built this small one in the mountains of Austria and used it in temperatures ranging from -10 degrees Celcius to -20 degrees Celcius (14 to -4 degrees Fahrenheit) with snow and wind on two consecutive days. The one I built gave about 10 to 12 degrees Celcius of extra warmth (-20 outside, -8 inside) which can mean all the difference in a survival situation. You can use a man made sleeping pad or natural materials for insulation from the ground and you can optionally build a simple door or windbreak to keep the warm air in and the cold air out. You'll see the ins and outs of building a quinzhee, how to construct it and what to watch out for. I'll be crawling in it, you'll see me getting in there and doing some temperature checks in the night both inside and outside. I'll finish it off with a good old destruction test. You can build one of these on your own in about 30 to 45 minutes in perfect conditions with the right tools. It took me a little longer because of the filming and goofing around.There is danger in building these shelters as any snow structure might collapse if not properly built. This is not a disclaimer, if it collapses on you, you're just sh*t out of luck. good luck sueing me :-).

Category:

Howto & Style

Tags:

• quinzhee
• kwinzi
• quinzee
• snow
• shelter
• cave
• iglo
• protection
• survival
• fallkniven a1
• fenix ld10
• north face superlight
• bivy bag
• how to
• demo
• tutorial
• austria
• thermarest
• piss bottle
• nalgene

[axolotlwithexotics]

oh wow it says....source protection-area admission forbidden

[zyhano]

@axolotlwithexotics hehe, of course, I knew :) It was the source of a spring used in the village nearby.. an old sign actually as I was informed later

[kunstsein]

Hochkönig in Salzburg? Not the worst place to be i would say. Very instructional videowork there zyhano, well done. I wouldn't mind if you make more of these in the near future. thank you and servus

the sign did said *fuck off* indeed :>

[zyhano]

@kunstsein lol, yeah.. I've got a vid coming up on the esee junglas in Finland. lots more snowshelters in that one

[BOOMtargetdown]

can you do this when the snow isn't sticky at all, when its just powder ?

[zyhano]

@BOOMtargetdown the snow was very powdery. I wasn't even able to make a decent snowball for playing with my kids :)

[RuffSkwad1]

I farted... and it stank!

[nextexhale]

How long does it take to make this kind of shelter from start to finish? Good video. Thanks.

[zyhano]

hehe, yeah, it does...maybe it was the cold affecting my translation skills at that moment lol

[40DegreeShoulder]

I don't speak German either, but I'm pretty sure that sign said GTFO. lol