Date of Observation: 12/30/2021
Name: Eric Murrow

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Standard skin track up and traversed above 1st and 2nd bowls on the north side. Descended my up-track down to the trailhead.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: I inspected several previously reported avalanches on northerly slopes from 12/27 (likely ran on 12/24) and found around 2 feet of low-density snow accumulated on bed surfaces. I purposely traveled above 1st and 2nd bowls to look at slopes that avalanched during 12/9-10 cycle to find out if these slopes avalanched again, and, to my surprise, these slopes appeared to be holding all of the storm snow since 12/23.
Weather: Overcast skies with continuous light snowfall from 11am-4pm. Around 4pm snowfall rates increased. Winds were generally very light between 9,600 – 11,100 feet. Trees at the summit of Snodgrass were holding lots of snow.
Snowpack: No signs of instability during the tour, I traveled off the beaten track in several areas on sunny and shady slopes. I dug a profile on a southeasterly slope at 10,400 feet and found a sensitive storm snow interface around a foot below the surface but did not experience any cracking underfoot. A second interface, in the middle of the snowpack, was softer than layers above and below but did not produce propagating results. Snow depths on northeast through east through southeast slopes ranged from 130cm to 180cm.

Date of Observation: 12/30/2021
Name: Billy Barr

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Gothic Townsite

Observed avalanche activity: No
Weather: Obscured, of course, but only light wind yesterday afternoon along with light snow as well. But the wind picked up late in the day and continued through the night. The 24 hour snow totals were 7″ new (5″ overnight) and 0.59″ of water, the heaviest snowfall coming in the last hour. Currently light snow and steady wind with gusts in the 30’s. The snowpack is up to 49″. Very little temperature movement again as the range has held between 13 and 19F in the past 24 hours. Again substantial snow movement from the wind though the snowpack (down here) is setting up fast. billy

Date of Observation: 12/29/2021
Name: Eric Murrow

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Washington Gulch TH to Anthracite mesa. Ascended low-angle east and northeast slopes to ridgetop.  Avoided being on or underneath avalanche terrain.

Observed avalanche activity: No
Avalanches: None observed. Brief views of SW side of Snodgrass and steep, leeward northeasterly shots immediately above Long Lake. Mother nature teased me several times with fuzzy views of Gothic, but never clear enough to read the snow surface.
Weather: Very consistent light snowfall (S1) from 11 – 330. Winds were blowing around 10 mph with gusting to around 20 mph on ridgetop at 10,500 feet. Some efficient loading was observed on to northeast-facing lee slopes.
Snowpack: I mostly traveled on east and northeast slopes below treeline and a few small southeast-facing slopes. No collapsing or cracking observed. Strong, supportive slabs 100-130cm thick exist over weak snow near the ground on northeast and east terrain. Stability tests indicated unstable conditions (see profile). I stomped, ski stabbed, and boot packed into the weak layer above two suspect northeast slopes without result. On southeast features, the snowfall from December has largely fallen on bare dirt with intermittent crusts at the ground.

Date of Observation: 12/29/2021
Name: billy barr

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Gothic

Observed avalanche activity: No
Avalanches:
Weather: More of the same with light snow and generally strong wind. Snow stopped for a couple hours in the afternoon but still no visibility at all and there has been none for the past 6 days except once for 2 hours. That said there was 6½” new snow with water 0.51″ and the snowpack is at the winter’s deepest of 45½”. Currently light snow but the wind stopped about 45 minutes ago. That makes it practically summer, right?. No temperature movement in tht the high was 18 and the low 14 for the past 21 hours.
Snowpack:

Date of Observation: 12/28/2021
Name: Zach Guy and Evan Ross

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: Quick afternoon snowmobile tour out to look at 7 sisters and back, testing some small slopes enroute

Observed avalanche activity: No
Avalanches: Poor visibility. 7 sisters stayed put. Couldn’t see much else for avalanche terrain.
Weather: Moderate snowfall all afternoon, light winds in valley location.
Snowpack: Deep, unconsolidated snowpack; about 5 feet down to persistent weak layers. Boot pen is about 4 feet. We slope cut a handful of low elevation, south facing test slopes with no cracking or signs of instability. We got one large collapse on a low angle, shady aspect while Evan and I were both wrestling with his stuck snowmobile (see photo).  The wrestle-your-snowmobile-unstuck test did not produce any results on southerly facing, below treeline slope, despite numerous tests in various locations.

Date of Observation: 12/27/2021
Name: Zach Guy and Eric Murrow

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Snowmobiled out Cement Creek to about 10,500 ft, near Hunter Hill trail.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Looks like one fresh persistent slab ran with yesterday’s winds. Spotted two other persistent slabs that ran during the Santa Slammer. All of these were on relatively small slopes so  D1.5 in size or less. Nothing significant has hit the road (yet), a few small debris piles in the narrows near the start of Upper Cement Trail.
Weather: Light to moderate snowfall. Light winds in valley bottom.
Snowpack: In windsheltered, below treeline terrain, persistent slab thickness ranged from 2 feet (near Reno Road split) to a little over 3 feet (near Hunter Hill). We observed several rumbling collapses in low-angle terrain. One occurred while I was standing outside of a pit, while Eric was boondocking over a 1/4 mile away. I think he triggered it. It was the loudest and most startling collapse I have ever heard…it sounded like a jet engine. I could hear it approaching from a distance across a wide open slope and watched the slope drop. I triggered another large collapse riding in sparse trees and saw all of the trees start shaking in front of me. Eric was a long distance away and he also heard “what sounded like an explosive detonate”. Stability tests produced hard, propagating results on the 12/6 interface. We rode on or near a handful of relatively small, steep test slopes without triggering anything. The 12/23 facets appear to be rounding and hardening, but the 12/6 depth hoar/ surface hoar falls out of the pit, it is still fist hard and cohesionless.

Date of Observation: 12/26/2021

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Snodgrass 11k

Observed avalanche activity: No
Snowpack: Snodgrass N 11k snowpit. HS 125, CT 9 95 cm up, CT 15 20 cm up, ECTN despite whaling.

Date of Observation: 12/26/2021
Name: billy barr

Zone: Southeast Mountains

Weather: Really little to report. The wind stopped mid day Saturday and there was gradual clearing and it dropped to 2ºF during the night before clouds moved back in and is at 24F now. There was scattered light snow with 1″ new and water of 0.11″. The wind started back around 3 a.m. and has not let up. A nasty day ahead. Snowpack sits at 39½” and sky is obscured and windy 8-15 SW gusts to 30 with a very light to no snowfall. –This winter is still 23% below average on snowfall but, get this, just 1% below in water content, which shows how dense these storms have been.

Date of Observation: 12/25/2021
Name: Eric Murrow

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Avalanche obs from the road.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Photos and coding for avalanches previously reported.
Photos: