Avalanche
- Slab Width
- 18 m
- Trigger Type
- Natural
- Slab Thickness
- 15 cm
- Start Zone Aspect
- Southeast
- Start Zone Elevation
- 2347 m
Early tour up West Porter. I knew the snow would be heavy, given the rain line at 7500 feet, but didn't expect to see quite so much wet slide activity. At about 7500 feet the entire north side of the drainage was riddled with wet slide after wet slide. There wasn't a discernible crown to any of them. They just seemed to be lots of heavy mashed potatoes lumbering down the slope (with precious little gravy to ski). Due to time (the heavy snow made for slow trail-breaking and the slides diverted me away from the normal skin track to break further to the south) I didn't get much above 8300 feet, but the snow remained quite dense. I had planned to ski a favorite line into Main Porter but figured the steep slope I'd have to climb over to get into it was a bad idea given the conditions, so I slowly escaped down West Porter. (On a 30 degree slope I managed to steal some decent turns at 7000 feet.)