Date of Observation: 01/02/2021
Name: Zach Guy

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Location: Poverty Gulch
Aspect: North, North East, East
Elevation: 9,600 – 12,200

Avalanches: One small natural wind slab that ran last night or this morning (E, NTL). No other fresh avalanches observed.
Weather: Moderate winds with light transport. Clouds increased through the day with a few snow flurries this afternoon.
Snowpack: Skinned, snowmobiled, stomped, and skied on dozens of previously untrammeled low angled slopes (mostly near/below treeline) without any obvious signs of instability today, in stark contrast to just about every tour in the past few weeks. It appears as if the snowpack in this deeper part of the zone is moving to a low likelihood, high consequence persistent slab problem. On a NE aspect near treeline, the slab is about 4 feet thick, mostly 1 finger hard. The 12/10 interface is 4F- to F+ 1.5 mm facets. Stability tests produced a mix of hard, propagating results (ECTP30) and propagation during isolation (ECTPV, which might have been user error).

Photos:

Date of Observation: 12/31/2020
Name: Aaron Peterson

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Location: Washington Gulch
Aspect: South East
Elevation: 11,500

Avalanches: We did not observe any new slides.
Weather: Clear, calm, and gorgeous.
Snowpack: We traveled on south through east facing terrain to the east of Elkton and felt routine collapsing on and off the skin track. Most notably, our pit showed a relatively firm (1 finger plus, almost pencil hard) slab resting on 40cm of basal facets. Test results on this interface were hard to trigger (CT 22- resistant, and ECTX), however they propagated easily (PST 34/100 end). The slab was stubborn and sturdy, but still scary. As if to drive the point home, after demolishing our pit I stepped aside and onto a thinner patch of snow near a wind blown feature. This triggered a very large wumph across our snowfield. “Nearly pant altering” according to my partner. We were incredibly happy not to be on steeper terrain.

Photos:

Date of Observation: 12/30/2020
Name: Zach Kinler
Zone: Southeast Mountains/ Northwest Mountain

Avalanches: Many avalanches from D1-D2.5 were observed at all elevation bands in both the Southeast and Northwest Mountains. Some failed around the new/old interface with crowns around a foot thick while others failed on the 12/10 interface with crowns 2-4 ft thick. East aspects were the most active benefiting from the combination of fragile buried weak layers and loading from recent westerly winds. Check out the pics below for a better idea of what failed and where.

Weather: Sunny skies, moderate to strong NW winds were observed in the upper Cement area with snow transport along ridges and peaks early this morning.

Date of Observation: 12/30/2020
Name: Alex Tiberio

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Location:
Aspect: North East
Elevation: 10,500

Avalanches: A couple fresh naturals ran today near the snodgrass gothic saddle sometime between 10 and 2 and saw another older slide below gothic road closer to the snodgrass trailhead
Weather:
Snowpack: Talkative. Large collapses if going off the ski track

Photos:

Date of Observation: 12/30/2020

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Location: Slate drainage
Aspect: East, South East
Elevation: ATL

Avalanches: A lot of natural avalanches, huge on purple and one on gothic.
Weather:
Snowpack: Shooting cracks and a couple large collapses while breaking trail.

Photos:

Date of Observation: 12/30/2020
Name: Sam L

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Location: Upper slate
Aspect: North, North East
Elevation:

Avalanches: Observed a new large natural in Baxter basin.
Weather: Cold and clear. Traveling uphill on southerly slopes was very warm but with little discernible change in snow surface.
Snowpack: Traveling up hill through north facing terrain produced several large and rumbling collapses with shooting cracks running hundreds of feet (see photo). Skiing southwest terrain we traveled through 12 to 15 inches of consolidating storm overlying a stout sun crust.

Photos: