Vail & Summit County

You can easily trigger a large avalanche. Observers continue to report remote triggering large avalanches from a distance. Obvious signs of instability like cracking and collapsing are diminishing. The first warning you may get is the crack of an avalanche as you get enveloped in moving snow. Slopes with a lot of wind-drifted snow will produce the largest avalanches; the edges of pillows and steep rocky areas will be the easiest places to trigger an avalanche. With such tricky conditions, avoiding steep slopes is the only way to reduce your hazard.