Avalanche

Noisy Basin

Cam JohnsonSwan Range
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Quick report

Cracking
isolated

I took a lap up to the Aeneas wind station for a routine check-up. Overall I found generally stable avalanche conditions.

  • A very thick and hard crust blankets the mountains. This crust was roughly 40 cm thick at 7000 feet. 
  • East winds wreaked havoc on the dusting of snow that fell on Wednesday. I found thin and small slabs of drifted snow in exposed terrain. I stomped on a couple of short test slopes and was able to produce shooting cracks and triggered one small hard slab.   
  • New snow sluffed easily on north-facing slopes sheltered from the wind. These weren't large enough to bury a mouse in this location, but might be a different story in other parts of the forecast area that received a couple more inches of fresh snow.  
  • Slide for life conditions are in full effect. Bring your crampons and whippets if you are going for steep objectives. 

A corn harvest is T'ed up for the coming days! 

I was able to trigger a very small wind slab on a short test slope on a west facing slope at upper elevations.

Weather

Air Temp
Below Freezing
Cloud Cover
clear
Wind Loading
previous
Recent Snowfall
5
Snow Avail For Transport
small smounts

Cold air temps and a cold east wind kept surfaces cool at upper elevations until my departure at roughly 2 pm. Surfaces were just begining to get sticky at middle elevations on my exit.

Snowpack

A 40 cm knife hard surface crust exists on west facing slopes at upper elevations. I dug another 2 feet below this crust and the snow was wet.  

Avalanche

Size
D1
Type
HS
Aspect
SW
Trigger
AS
Elevation
7000 ft

Triggered a very small hard slab on a west facing aspect.