bears ruckusing through the streets breaking into trailer houses and kicking over bird feeders as it is episodes of drunken driving or domestic violence. More significantly, a large portion of the town sits directly in the path of one of the most dangerous avalanche chutes in the world. Every winter a broad alpine funnel pointed directly at Juneau’s heart waits for an accumulation of heavy, wet snow to build on top of a layer of older snow that has been scoured to an icy crust by relentless arctic winds— a combination that will someday send several thousand megatons of snow exploding at speeds of up to 180 miles an hour through the back doors of the houses below. In 1972 one avalanche blew down the mountain and screeched to a stop at the very verge of the imaginary membrane, mere yards from a densely populated neighborhood. The powder blast generated by the slide obliterated the town from view, startling the city’s residents into a breathless recognition of the true nature of their town’s setting. Nonetheless, they dutifully swept away the ice crystals that settled like glittering ash across the sidewalks and within a disturbingly short time