Date of Observation: 03/03/2022
Name: jeff banks

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Skied mostly Sunny aspects & short N facing slope

Observed avalanche activity: No

Weather: 4F at 8:00, climbing out of the valley inversion temps were warming fast
intermittent thin clouds & negligible wind did little to slow the melt

Snowpack: 20-25cm re-freeze this AM in valley floor
~10-15cm re-freeze ~10,000ft

~9:20 Passed on skinning up SE slopes > 30º as the crust was quickly melting and exposing the moist, weak facets below. poor structure in shallow snowpack.

S & SW have much more developed (thicker & full corn) melt freeze structure and more more supportive to skis as the day warmed.

Only traveled on 1 N face slope ~50m in size, but produced:
2 Medium shooting cracks & collapse ~5m long & 2-3cm drop
1 Large shooting crack & collapse ~15m long & 3-5cm drop

Date of Observation: 03/03/2022

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Northeast side of Carbon from the Carbon Creek TH (8,800-11,400ft). Climbed E, SE & NE; descended NW & NE.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Two naturals that seemed fairly fresh. A wet slab (D2) on one of the east chutes. A wind slab (D1) below a cross-loaded ridge in the main cirque that started in the new snow and stepped down to near the ground above a cliff band.

Weather: Hot at 9:30, and only got hotter. No wind. Light cloud cover.

Snowpack: A mixed bag. Exposed E & SE slopes were already quite wet at 10:00. Some slopes were supportable, others were breaker. Lots of collapsing on these slopes, where you get the sense that the wet surface snow is levitating an inch or two above the junk below. Someone yesterday described northern pow as “cream cheese.” Today it seemed a little more like when you try to make ghetto ice cream by shaking milk, vanilla, sugar & snow in a ziploc bag for 20 minutes. Lightly rippled alpine snow (NW & NE) was fabulous! Down low (12:30) it was more like sloppy mashed potatoes with a little too much milk & butter.

Date of Observation: 03/02/2022
Name: Zach Guy

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: 3 p.m. views of Rustlers Gulch, Copper Creek, Deer Creek, Pearl Pass, etc. from CBMR.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: A handful of undocumented D1 to 1.5 wet avalanches that ran sometime in the past few days. One looked like a D1.5 wet slab on a west aspect NTL above Pearl Pass Road. In the same terrain feature, another D1.5 wet pile that I suspect could be a wet slab but couldn’t see the start zone. The rest were all D1 wet loose.
Weather:
Snowpack:

Date of Observation: 03/02/2022

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: Anthracites , Tree Chute and 7 Bowl

Observed avalanche activity: No
Avalanches: None in the immediate area

Weather: Calm and Warm

Snowpack: It was like skiing cream cheese . The warmth from yesterday made the snowpack dense anything exposed to the sun was getting crispy or starting to get wet by about 10am.

Date of Observation: 03/01/2022

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Carbon via Splain’s Gulch. 9,200-12,000 ft. NW & NE aspects. Traveled on slopes at or below 30 degrees.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: A few very small snowcat, skier and snow machine-triggered pockets along the road cut in Splain’s.
Weather: Calm, clear and balmy!
Snowpack: Lots of collapsing, including a few that felt more like small earthquakes. Most of the activity was in or around forested terrain, but there was one big one on an open, more alpine slope (25 degree) near treeline that sent cracks rocketing out toward the steeper terrain to the west of me. Widespread surface hoar on open slopes to about 10,600 feet. Solar aspects were super mushy later in the day. Had to wax my skins four times and scrape my bases three times. I despise gloppy snow! Snow quality on north aspects was fabulous. Skating on the groomed roads was all-time!

Date of Observation: 02/28/2022
Name: Tim Mahan

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: Keebler pass TH, through the Y, through lily lake, through splains.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: 1x SS-AM-D2-U-250’x300’ approx. West facing BTL slope adjacent to Ohio/kebler pass Y.
Weather: CLR, 30-40f
Snowpack: N/O

Date of Observation: 02/28/2022
Name: Miles Morris

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Climb red Lady skin decend red Lady bowl 2x
First decent was skiers left of red Lady, slide released well after I was off the slope.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: R1 D1 18″ 100 yards wide, 500ft vertical
Weather: Clear
Snowpack:

Date of Observation: 02/28/2022

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Coney’s, ENE aspect (9,400-10,800ft). Climbed into the open terrain just north of the standard skin track.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Fresh-looking D1 on skiers left side of main bowl. 40(ish)cm crown. 20 feet wide, and ran 100 feet into the only trees on the slope. May have been remotely triggered from a skier on the knob just to the north. Cracks ran 200 feet to the south along the ridge.
Weather: No wind. Blue sky. Scorching sun!
Snowpack: Very large, widespread surface hoar in the morning that had vanished by noon. New snow was dense and creamy in the main bowl. Slopes tilted toward the sun were rapidly warming by late morning, getting very wet and sticky. Still lots of violent collapses lower on the slope, in lower-angle forested terrain. Only one sizable collapse (on second ascent) in steeper terrain on the ridge feature just south of the main bowl.

Date of Observation: 02/27/2022

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Snowmobiled out W Brush. Ascended early ridge which seperates Deer Creek and W Brush Creek. Started at around 9600′ and topped out at roughly 10500′. Played a little mini golf.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: No surprise, lots of activity everywhere at virtually all aspects and elevations, both old and new. We assume our snowmobiles remote-triggered a small wind-loaded pocket (E), around 75 yards adjacent to an open hillcrest (picture attached). Lot’s of debris visible on some Westerlies but East seemed to be the bigger instigator (no surprise with the winds). Didn’t get eyes on many N aspects. Topped out on a SE/ E facing slope which looked to have ripped mid-cycle.
Weather: Sunny and very light winds BTL. Applied the whitey sauce a couple times but still proved to be insufficient. Wasn’t extremely warm but the solar was certainly in play. Felt like early spring for sure.
Snowpack: Not nearly as much new snow as some of the favored areas, at least at the lower elevations. However, it was certainly noisy whilst breaking in the skinner, so we kept it mellow and stayed below 30ish degrees all day. Stomped on a couple suspect slopes and had some big collapses, but we weren’t on anything steep enough to move any kind of slap. Overall, snow on S and SE felt pretty good. Worth noting: there were a couple big debris piles near valley floor on steeper E aspects a little further up the valley… Around 11am, the new snow was beginning to get heavy on the sunnies and continued to get baked throughout the day. One would assume a varying sun crust should be expected at this aspect and elevation tomorrow.

Date of Observation: 02/27/2022
Name: Phil Ott

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: Standard Anthracite Skin Track

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: No new unreported Avalanches.
Weather: Bluebird, 23F,
Snowpack: Observed no instabilities as we traveled up the skin track, stepping off often. Dug a pit on a 30 degree NNE slope at 10760, this area was on the leeward side of trees and likely was more loaded with a HS of 295cm. F from 295cm down to 240cm, 4F from 240cm to 200cm, F to bottom of pit. We noticed a dirt layer that can be seen in the pic. We got a result of ECTP23 at 200cm (95cm from surface) SP Q1, the block slid out an inch or two and was very clean.