Quick report
- Cracking
- specific
- Collapsing
- isolated
On all aspects up to 5600 feet we found storm slabs that were reactive. In a snowpit (N aspect 5500 ft) we had no pertinent results deeper in the snow pack and were not able to find the faceted snow that was reported at slightly higher elevations prior to the intense series of storms that we have received in the last week. While there were significant amounts of wind transported snow during our travel we didn't observe significant wind slab development. On steeper slopes we saw widespread cracking and we were able to release numerous ~40cm deep slabs on test slopes. On the one larger piece of avalanche terrain that we skied, we triggered a D2 avalanche that propagated widely wrapping around terrain features. All of these avalanches were running on a slight density change within the new storm snow.
Avalanche
- Size
- D2 R4
- Type
- SS
- Aspect
- NE
- Trigger
- AS
- Elevation
- 5500 ft
SS-ASc-R4-D2-S This avalanche was triggered from the far skiers left part of the path. I performed a ski cut on a small convexity and exited into low angle terrain on the left side of the path. The avalanche initiated from this spot and propagated ~500 ft to skiers right wrapping around terrain features and ending at lower angled terrain.