Zipper Couloir, Tatoosh Range. Aspects facing S to W to NE, elevations ranging from 4400’ to 5400’.

Quick report

Checked out the Zipper Couloir from Narada Falls TH. Forest booting was firm but quick. Once arriving at the bottom of the Zipper Couloir, we were treated to a mixed bag of bad snow conditions. Most of the N side of Lane peak looks to have slid naturally during the 1/13-1/15 warm spell. The largest of which was a pair of natural wet loose avalanches size D2.5 or larger and piled debris many feet deep in the runout after running the nearly full path. The couloir itself was firm wet loose bed surface with occasional small pockets of wind drifted snow. No wind slabs or wind drifting was observed. Where the slope had not slid, we observed 30cm+ of loose facets below a breakable 2cm melt-freeze crust. In open areas, we found very well developed surface hoar and weak facets although this was only observed in the low angle meadows.