Avalanche: Powder Park

Wind loaded slope broke on January facets. Skier carried 300' vertical feet and buried to their neck with no injuries.

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From February 6, 2004 Avalanche Forecast

Yesterday, three avalanches were triggered that broke into old snow, with the end result of skiers taking rides into trees and one being buried up to his neck. Fortunately, no one was greatly injured in the events. All of the slides were reported to be mid and upper elevation northerly slopes 1-3’ deep and 50-200’ wide, running on the buried facets formed on the surface of the snow during the mid January high pressure. The first slide was a hard slab 1-3’ deep and 50’ wide, triggered by explosives in a closed area in the Park City resort that propagated higher than expected and onto a 30 degrees slope. This exemplifies the classic problem of a hard slab/persistent weak layer combination in its ability to pull out lower angled slopes and break higher on the slope than usual. Another, in upper Powder Park of Mill D north, a backcountry party triggered a slab that broke into old snow, reporting it to be 2-3’ deep and 200’ wide. And the last was a ski cut in upper Big Cottonwood that pulled out a small 12’ pocket that broke 2’ deep into old snow. Collapsing in the snow at the mid-elevations is still being reported as well, more signs from the snowpack that things are on edge. So, it’s been a little unsettling how we’ve been teetering in the balance with our buried weak layers where it just hasn’t seen the load to make for an avalanche cycle. But clearly, with the snow adding up, some areas are beginning to be reactive.