Quick report
We went to the central Whitefish Range to suss out buried weak layers at upper elevations. We did find ourselves an avalanche and also found ourselves a lot of stable conditions. Just depends on where you look.
- We intentionally trundled a cornice down a north-facing slope at upper elevations. The cornice triggered a Hard Slab that failed 2 feet thick. This failed into old snow roughly 1 foot above the ground. (This was thoughtfully executed and over a slope where we confirmed no other parties were.)
- We observed no other signs of instability. We found generally safe avalanche conditions on solar aspects until our departure time of 2 pm.
- Previous sled tracks reached into many steep east-facing start zones with no triggered avalanches.
- We rode across old debris piles that came very close to reaching their historical trim lines. These avalanches failed sometime during late February or early March.
We steered away from complex upper elevation start zones on shaded aspects. We did ride in steep terrain on other aspects.
Weather
- Cloud Cover
- clear
- Wind Loading
- none
- Snow Avail For Transport
- small smounts
Beauty of a day.
Avalanche
- Size
- D2 R3
- Type
- HS
- Count
- 3
- Aspect
- NE
- Trigger
- AC
- Elevation
- 7000 ft
Cornice fall triggered a Hard Slab 2 feet thick. The slope did not have a lot of room for it to propagate widely. Rocky terrain and thin snowpack reduced the likelihood for that.