American Avalanche Association Awards

For further information about the awards and procedures, click here. Contact Awards Chair .

In order to recognize and encourage outstanding service and contribution to our mission, the AAA has established an awards program. Awards criteria and past recipients are detailed below.

Honorary Membership
This is the highest award bestowed by the American Avalanche Association. It is given annually or less frequently, to a person who has distinguished themselves by special achievement in the field of snow avalanches.

The purpose of this award is to bring honor to the awardees, to provide inspiration to the membership, and to emphasize the programs to which the Association is dedicated. The number of awards will be restricted so as not to include more than 20 living individuals at any one time.

Candidates need not be an AAA member though membership is customary.

2006 Art Judson
2004 Rod Newcomb
2002 Doug Fessler
2000 Sam Colbeck
Bob Brown
1998 Sue Ferguson (Deceased)
1996 Peter Schaerer
1995 John Montagne
1992 Dick Reuter
1991 Dale Gallagher (Deceased)
1990 Norm Wilson (Deceased)
1989 Ed LaChapelle (Deceased)
1987 Monty Atwater (Posthumously)
John Herbert (Posthumously)
Pete Martinelli

Bernie Kingery Award for Dedicated Professional Practice
Recognizes sustained career contributions by dedicated avalanche field professionals. Candidates are primarily engaged in avalanche forecasting, mitigation, research or education and safety.

This award is in honor of John Bernier Kingery's long career of ski patrol and snow safety work. Kingery became the Mountain Manager of Alpine Meadows Ski Area and was killed there in 1982 in the most deadly avalanche in North American ski area history.

This award is open only to AAA Professional Members.

2006 Randy Elliott
2004 Bruce Tremper
2002 Tom Kimbrough
2000 Don Bachman
1998 Liam Fitzgerald
1997 Jim Hackett (Posthumously)
Binx Sandahl (Deceased)
1996 Larry Heywood
1994 Rod Newcomb
1992 Bernie Kingery (Posthumously)

Honorary Fellowship Award
The honorees are recognized by their peers in the AAA for significant contribution to avalanche-related programs in countries other than the United States and, in general, for communicating their work to those in the U.S. so that those contributions may be shared for common benefit.

Membership in the AAA is not a prerequisite to candidacy for this award.

2006 Juerg Schweizer
2004 Paul Foehn
2002 Horst Schaffhauser
Kayou Fukuyama
2000 (No award given)
1998 Kartsein Leid
1996 Paval A. Chernouss
1994 Tsutomu "Tom" Nakamura
David McClung
1992 Hansueli Gubler
1990 Andre Roch (Deceased)
Peter Schaerer
Ron Perla
Hans Frutiger
Walter Good
Geoff Freer

Special Service Award
Recognizes specific and outstanding achievement in the service of North American snow avalanche activity. Generally the Governing Board will initiate the nomination and approval process.

It is not necessary that the recipient be a member of AAA, but that has generally been the case.

2007 Jerry Nunn
2006 Pete Peters
Don Sharaf
2004 John Simms
2002 (record missing, if anyone has this information, please contact us)
2000 Steve Conger
1998 Alan Dennis
1997 Bruce Jamieson
1996 Liam Fitzgerald
1994 Betsy Armstrong
Robin Faisant
1993 Bruce Tremper
Knox Williams
1992 Stan Bones
1990 Sue Ferguson (Deceased)
John Montagne
Bruce Tremper
Larry Heywood
Greg Mace (Posthumously)
Chris Stethem