In 2014, two Colorado avalanche control workers were whisked to the hospital after an avalauncher accident near the Continental Divide. They had been using the avalauncher, a compressed gas cannon, to shoot small charges into snowy slopes that posed a serious avalanche risk to motorists below. This is how it’s done in Colorado’s high country: Safety teams use explosives to loosen snow that might otherwise accumulate heavily and eventually slide in a deadly avalanche. That day in 2014, the charge exploded too early, in the barrel of the launcher.