Quick report
- Cracking
- isolated
Toured up through the normal skin track through the north glades of Incline Peak. There was 8-16inches of new storm snow from today and yesterday (skied the same terrain on the 3/5). This new storm snow was poorly adhered to the previous surface which was a strong and supportive melt-freeze crust in most areas (particular the sun-exposed and E/S aspects). There was significant wind transport occurring from the NW winds we saw. Once we got to the summit of Incline Peak, we moved south along the ridge to look at the small cornices and obvious wind loading that had occurred on and over the SE face due to the predominantly NW winds the area has been seeing. While touring along the ridge, we initiated multiple shooting cracks to obvious trigger points. These cracks were 15-25 feet long. We remotely triggered a small wind slab over the SE face, and intentionally triggered an additional wind slab with some light kicks. Overall the dry loose and wind slab problems we encountered were manageable, and appeared to only be consequential in steeper terrain with features that could make triggering easier and increase likelihood of injury if caught up in it. We also noted that instabilities and triggering was easier on terrain that was icier underneath the new storm snow. This was terrain that was more sun exposed and had stronger melt-freeze crusts from the previous warm weather.
Avalanche
- Size
- D1.5
- Aspect
- E
- Trigger
- AS
- Elevation
- 8900 ft
With all the instabilities I had been seeing today an the previous day (easy to initiate sluff, shooting cracks on wind loaded terrain, and knowing the previous surface is ice), I ski cut the top of the chute on the skiers left of the NE bowl of Incline. The whole chute released and ran out to the trees below. There was not slab-like behavior, definitely was dry-loose. After the initial cut, I cut a bit more terrain that also drained into the chute, and then skied the ice and avalanche debris.