April 1, 2009 A shovel for snow that shovels snow. Nothing too out of the ordinary there, but look a little closer and the cleverness of this multifunctional design becomes apparent. Designed for both avalanche rescue and more mundane tasks on the mountain like digging out beleaguered motorists, the ORTOVOX Grizzly sports a large, sharp aluminum blade designed to shift compact snow quickly, but the clever bit is the folding mechanism that transforms the shovel into a pick when fixed at a right angle, or collapses fully for convenient transportation.
The Grizzly comes in two flavors - Grizzly 1 has a normal 35cm (13.7") handle with a T-grip while Grizzly 2 sports a telescopic handle for additional leverage and a D-grip set up. Both feature an oval cross-section shaft designed for maximum stability and an Anti-slip Strap. The fast folding mechanism for collapsing the shovel and using the axe function is engaged by pushing a button located at the top of the handle with a locking bolt engaging automatically to hold the blade in the desired position.
The Grizzly is designed by FRACKENPOHL POULHEIM and manufactured by Ortovox.
Anne Hanrahan
