West Nile

Headed to West Nile planning to stick to trees. Looked up, it looked awesome. Decided to dig a pit at TL. Glad we did, stayed below TL. Note: traversed open roll to get a ‘better’ line....slid about 15 feet down slope on a layer 15-20cm down ~30 degree slope. Headed back to trees ASAP.

Wind was calm until about 14:00hrs when it became noticeable from the south.

Total snow pack 220cm Pit depth 120cm ENE slope, sun all morning Forgot to get slope angle. 0-20cm - 4F 20-70cm - 1F 70-75cm - <1F (softer than the layer above but not 4F) 75-120cm - Low density sugar ECT - M6, planar @ 28cm No propagation CT - M4, planar @28cm M6 planar @ 37cm H9, planar @ 100cm H10, planar @ 110cm *Each layer remained in place until slid off by hand after the 30 strikes. *each failure was sudden planar, no pop or drop noted. Traversed open roll just above and 75m north of test site to get a ‘better’ line. While standing still; the snow gave way and slid on the hard layer ~20cm down for 5m. Skier remained standing, path was width of skis and stopped while still on slope (no reason to stop other than snow build up). Skier returned to TL without incident. Saw evidence of 3 recent size 1+ coming off overhead cliffs. All stopping on slope, not making it to the bottom.