Off-piste skiing and snowboarding are more popular than ever. But also dangerous. Every year more than 5.000 people worldwide are buried by avalanches. Unfortunately, most of them don’t wear avalanche emergency equipment. Because it’s expensive and the danger is often underestimated. This makes it extremely hard for the mountain rescue to find and recover them in time.

Save me is the first ski pass with a built-in positioning chip. With this every skier in the ski resort Sölden is automatically locatable. After an avalanche a radio signal is immediately being sent out. The reflector in the pass returns it. And the mountain rescue can then pinpoint the victim’s exact location. The good thing about Save Me: The reflector is passive, meaning it doesn’t need batteries, so it’s always "on".

In July 2015 Sölden Ski resort started to develop Save me as a two-part technology:

1. A detector carried by the mountain rescue, which sends out a search signal.

2. The ski pass, which throws back a directional signal that leads the rescuer to the victim. The pass consists of an RFID data storage medium for hands-free access to the slopes on the one hand. And of the reflector: a diode fixed to a copper antenna. Both components (RFID + reflector) are molded into the pass.

The reflector in the pass is passive, meaning it doesn’t need batteries. The whole ski pass weighs less than 10 grams and has a maximum reach of 200 meters.

From December 2015 on the pass was sold at the Sölden ski resort. This made every skier automatically locatable under an avalanche. And Sölden not only one of the best but also safest ski resorts.