International Basin- Kingsbury Hut

SSVSS , Tuesday 2nd April, 2024 6:20PM

Spent 5 nights out at Kingsbury Hut from March 26th-31st. Between March 26-30th we received 2-8cm of new snow daily with light winds and poor visibility to get up high. We stuck to skiing the heli lines beneath Mt. Sandiland, the terrain behind the hut and the unnamed peak at the head of the valley. Skiing was excellent with 15-30cm of low density snow over the March 20th MFcr which we found on all aspects up to 2350m. The storm snow was reactive to ski cuts on steep convex rolls failing as a storm slab with good propagation on small grain facets above the crust/and or a mid storm graupel layer. The skies cleared on the evening of March 29th. On March 30th we awoke to clear skies and faceted surface snow which had reduced the storm slabs sensitivity to trigger. With the reduced sensitivity we headed for International Mountain, gaining the upper glacier via the North West buttress to the summit ridge. The backside is wind blasted with a semi supportive rhime crust overlying a heavily facetted snowpack, you can ski from 1/2 way down the summit ridge. Travel is straightforward. 50 cm of rightside up wind deposited F-1F snow overlies a stiff midpack in North 1/4 aspects above 2600m. On the glaciers we probed a minimum depth of 270cm with average depths being 350cm+. Over the course of the week we did not experience any whumpfing or cracking in anything other than the storm snow at lower elevations.