Quick report
- Cracking
- isolated
- Collapsing
- isolated
We noted shooting cracks and a whoomph on windblown micro terrain features on the saddle area of Ragged. It was also very windy so we chose not to continue toward the summit of Ragged, and descended the more wind protected route we had chosen. The route was more convex, less wind loading, with no terrain traps and a good runout. As we skied the snow felt variable with thin sun crust, small areas of wind effect, and soft turns. About half way down I was skiing second in an area of soft snow and thin snowpack when I triggered an avalanche on the ground layer of facets (see avy write up). Overall snow was extremely variable both ascending and descending, snowpack was very thin and wind scoured in many places.
Avalanche
- Size
- D1.5
- Aspect
- E
- Trigger
- AS
- Elevation
- 3278 ft
I triggered an avalanche skiing one of the skiers leftmost chutes in ragged bowl. Snow throughout the area was variable, with areas of sun crust and pockets of windblown, however the slide seemed to have been on the ground layer of facets. Grass and earth were visible in the area and slide was triggered when I skied closer to rocks than my partner. We believe I found a thin more easily triggered area in the snowpack. Was able to ski away to the side without consequence and thankfully my partner had chosen a protected area to stop below a large outcropping which split the debris. Estimate debris ran ~300ft.