Register
Get forecast notifications
Create an account to receive email notifications when forecasts are published.
Login

Wildhorses Couldn't Keep Us Away

wlewis, Thursday 8th February, 2024 3:40PM
We went in search of good skiing and crust observations up the Wildhorse today. Dug on a north and south aspect above 2000 m with no interesting results - the snowpack is faceted but settled from the mild temperatures, we'll take it! We were concerned about wind slabs sitting over the crust which extended up to 2300 m (our turnaround point). There was no evidence of wind effect and 10-20 cm of loose powder on north facing slopes. South facing slopes are a different story....where the breakable crust is on the surface. We decided the crust was a bust and descended north facing slopes, had some sluffing on steeper terrain the best turns were found on lower angle, mellow slopes. There was evidence of a large loose wet avalanche cycle from the rain with chunky debris from many steep features (but no slab avalanches which is promising in this typically weak snowpack), and no new avalanches or signs of instability were observed.

Location: 49.66303000 -115.58270000