Quick report
- Cracking
- isolated
Other than wind loading we also observed facets at the surface. Most sections of the skin track and downhill tracks were filling in within 5-10 min throughout most of the day. Our skin tracks in upper mountain were gone by the time we descended, despite only taking a 20 min break at the camp.
Weather
- Air Temp
- 10-20
- Wind Loading
- intense
The morning started off sunny but clouds rolled and sky was completely cloudy by about 1 pm. Very windy all day with gusts up to 25-30, but surprisingly gusts stopped above 8000 or so. Unfortunately there was still plenty of wind loaded slopes above 8000 from previous days.
Snowpack
As expected, the entire route showed evidence of the winds. There was some wind loaded terrain, scoured surfaces, rime ice/chicken heads, wind lips, cornices, however no signs of instability except for on panorama face. We tested the slope on the skin track up pan face and nofed cracking but it did not propagate. No collapsing/whumpfs on the route.
Avalanche
- Size
- D1 R1
- Type
- U
- Aspect
- SE
- Elevation
- 6800 ft
Small D1 avalanche off skiers right of pan face. Likely failed due to wind loaded slope as it appeared pillowy on our way up. We saw the debris on our ski down so unsure of the trigger.