Date of Observation: 11/30/2022
Name: Ben Pritchett

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: Photos taken from near CB.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: See photos and details of natural activity from yesterday

Date of Observation: 11/30/2022
Name: Zach Guy

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Viewed from Mt. CB

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: A handful of D1 to D2 avalanches on north and east aspects on Whetstone, Emmons, Gothic that ran yesterday. Had good views of S/SW facing terrain out by Copper Creek and Red Ridge with no obvious activity.

Date of Observation: 11/30/2022
Name: bill barr

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Gothic

Weather: Light off and on snow Tuesday- a very dense, small crystal, cold weather snow but only 1″ new and 0.11″ of water. Wind was steady about 8-15 mph from the west. Clearing overnight and cold with the low -10ºF. Currently clear and -8 and wind is calm. Snowpack sits at 16″.

Date of Observation: 11/29/2022
Name: Evan Ross, Zach Kinler

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Washington Gulch, Anthracite Mesa. NE to SE. 9,800ft to 10,800ft.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: We saw a good number of small natural avalanches. D1’s on the aspects we traveled and at the below treeline elevation. Often easy to miss in both size and the poor light, and then ooo hey neighbor… Otherwise, the only other notable avalanches observed were a D1.5 and a D2 next to each other in Coney’s Bowl. They both had notable crowns in the 2ft range, but each ran out of accumulating mass and slope angle.

Weather: Accumulating snowfall and winds continued into the afternoon. The snowfall started to taper off in the early afternoon, while moderate winds remained. The obscured sky just started to break up towards the end of the day.

Snowpack: The subject line sums it up in a simple and frank way. On the NE to SE aspects we traveled the avalanche problem was reactive. We observed continued shooting crack throughout the tour. But those cracks most often wouldn’t propagate very far. The weak layer in this area was just too rough and interrupted by things like bushes and other ground clutter. We primarily traveled in an area with slope angles in the 35-degree or less range, had we been on steeper slopes we may have seen more movement as slabs may have overcome all the friction.

The weak layer is fairly simple. Large grained facets on the top of thick crusts on the SE end, to facets on thin crests around east, to just large and very weak facets on NE. We could dive in deeper but this is a quick summary. This particular weak layer just wasn’t that thick in this terrain. So it is often interrupted by vegetation and the ground. Near the rigeline and at our highest elevation traveled, the weak layer became thicker, more continuous, and lead to more notable avalanche results.

Storm totals on Washington Gultch Road were around 12″ in wind-sheltered areas. At first, this seemed low but made sense with the settlement. The storm snow was thick and slabby.

Date of Observation: 11/29/2022
Name: Zach Guy

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Nordic Hill. Northeasterly aspects around 9,000′

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Remotely triggered one small pocket about 12″ deep on the faceted storm interface.  Triggered from 100 feet away.
Snowpack: 12″ of new snow. Touchy conditions. Widespread shooting cracks and spiderweb style cracking. There was just enough surface roughness with the ground to keep avalanches from happening on this small slope near town.

Date of Observation: 11/29/2022
Name: billy barr

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Gothic

Weather: Snow started around 7 p.m. and kept up until 6 a.m., though was heaviest from 9-12 p.m. Wind picked up around midnight and stayed steady. There was 9″ new snow and 0.70″ of water content with 16″ on the ground now- deepest this winter. Currently overcast with light to moderate wind and snow has paused for the time being. temperatures have been cool after a high yesterday of 32F and now the low and current of 10F. The new snow, dense and wind blown, is making a solid slab and sitting on top of the rotten base could allow for slab release in higher and steeper areas.
Snowpack:

Date of Observation: 11/28/2022
Name: Zach Guy

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Red Lady Bowl, traveled on east and southeast aspects to 12,000′.

Observed avalanche activity: No
Avalanches: Got a few shooting cracks up to 10′ and tiny wind slabs to pop (3″ thick) on freshly drifted rollovers NTL.
Weather: Overcast. Moderate winds with periods of light blowing snow. Saw a few small plumes on other peaks.
Snowpack: Targeting weak layer development on the sunny aspects. In summary, the crust/facet layers are very weak on east aspects and get progressively stronger as you turn toward due south.The stronger crusts are more likely to survive early loading but could fail later in the season as more weight stacks up.

The snowpack structure on east to southeast aspects is a stack of crusts with very weak 2mm facets between, with some grains near the ground up to 4mm. The crusts change from stronger, thicker, and supportive on skis on due Southeast to very thin, punchy, and collapsible on due East.   See pits.  The crusts also appear to get thinner at higher elevations. There is also a surprisingly well-developed layer of facets on top of the crusts (~1.5mm facets). However, today’s winds were blowing this layer away in the alpine start zone. I found it fairly frequently, but not everywhere, in more sheltered rollovers lower in the bowl.

Date of Observation: 11/28/2022
Name: Evan Ross

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Lower Brush Creek and lower Cement Creek. Right in the donut hole.

Snowpack: Lower Brush Creek and lower Cement Creek is often characterized as being located within the “donut hole” portion of our greater forecast areas. This donut hole holds the least amount of snow when compared to the surrounding mountains. Anyway, this is of course the case right now.

Above treeline, old snow does exist around the compass. Though the southern half of the compass has spotty snow coverage on those slopes located closer to town and not as deep into the mountains.

Near treeline has old snow coverage on NW to NE. While W and E have some coverage but are fairly shallow and rough.

Below treeline, there is really just the northern quadrant to talk about for snow coverage. Even on north, the snow coverage is of course shallow, and often rough.

The camera is good a picking up “white” and “dark” colors but not so good at highlighting the finer details from afar. There is also a little bit of fresh snow in these photos and adding some white to non-problematic slopes.

Date of Observation: 11/25/2022
Name: Zach Guy

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: Anthracite Mountain Resort, northerly and east aspects to 11,200′.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Triggered a few shallow sluffs in East Bowl. They’re still quite small and not gouging through the whole snowpack like we’ve seen in previous seasons this time of year.
Weather: Clear, mild, calm.
Snowpack: Documenting weak layers on the shady aspects in advance of a pattern change next week. In short, it’s shallow and weak.  See profiles. The snow surface is very weak below treeline (F-) and will struggle to hold any kind of load. It’s faceted throughout, generally 1-1.5mm here. Sluffs are entraining the top 6″ or so, but would probably gouge deeper once they gained enough mass. In more wind-affected terrain NTL, the snowpack is more variable and surfaces are a stronger mix of wind crusts and old wind drifts. However, there’s plenty of weak, faceted snow below these harder layers. In previously wind-eroded areas, those facets are larger and more developed than below treeline.

Date of Observation: 11/24/2022
Name: Evan Ross

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: Purple Ridge Lap. Easterly, 9,600-11,500ft.

Observed avalanche activity: No
Avalanches: None

Weather: Trace of new snow. Few clouds. Moderate winds continuing to transport a little snow near ridgelines.

Snowpack: The recent northerly wind event sure wasn’t kind to the snow surface and riding conditions. Many slopes now have a variety of lovely textures like wind-board, wind crust, firm wind texture, soft wind texture, and wind-exposed crusts. Though it’s not all doom and gloom, there are still some areas with a soft snow surface, just fewer of those areas than a couple of days ago.

I didn’t encounter any thick wind drifts, but there were a lot of thin, hard slabs or wind-boards dispersed through the terrain. Given how weak the old snow is, these thin drifts often collapsed and occasionally produced shooting cracks. Though the actual slab size was very small. Looking around the area there were some cross-loaded terrain features and a few southerly-facing slopes, that may be holding some bigger slabs.