Building a Snow caveBuilding a Snow cave: Camping in snow is one thing, but there is no comparison between the calm, quiet, warm snow cave and loudly flapping tent, buffeted by gale force winds. This sort of protection is not quick to build; taking 2 or 3 hours, but it affords great protection in a storm. If you do a lot of winter walking, building a snow cave should form part of your survival repertoire.
Once you have dug out the cave, smooth off all upper surfaces with your gloved hand or a piece of plastic, making sure it all surfaces are concave. This ensures that melting snow will run down the walls and not drip on the occupants.
Remember to put in a vent hole to the outside world to avoid being asphyxiated. If it gets too hot, make the hole bigger! Put your skis, shovel or other equipment on top of the cave so people don’t walk over, risking the collapse of your home. Building a snow cave can be tiring work. Keep fluids up as you are likely to perspire heavily, and adjust layers of clothing so you don't become saturated. If you have a large party, two teams can work on building a snow cave at the same time.
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Snow caves can of course be dug by hand, although it is made much easier with the aid of a snow shovel. If you are travelling as part of a group in winter conditions, a telescopic shovel as part of group equipment is well worth the extra weight. If you don’t have a shovel you can improvise by using a plate or some other utensil.
Instead of creating one entrance, each team begins an entrance (2-4 metres apart) and then upwards as per previous instruction. Once the upward digging to create the air lock is complete, then each team digs sideways until they meet. One of the entrances can now be blocked off with snow, and a door made for the entrance with pack. Using this approach can halve the time to build a snow cave and keeps everyone occupied.
