Date of Observation: 02/28/2023
Name: Zach Guy

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Afternoon tour. Traveled up the southeast shoulder of Gothic to 11,500′ looking for wind slab feedback, and on east and northeast aspects of Snodgrass to monitor below treeline terrain.

Observed avalanche activity: No
Avalanches: Visibility of the surrounding terrain was very limited
Weather: Whiteout conditions mid-day with blowing snow and moderate snowfall rates. Both eased through the afternoon.
Snowpack: About 5″ or 6″ of storm snow in wind-sheltered terrain, with drifts up to 18″ as I climbed into exposed, near treeline slopes with decent-sized fetches. It was easy to trigger numerous shooting cracks while skinning across the top of small, drifted terrain features. Drifts were typically 10″ to 16″ thick soft slabs, breaking on or near the storm interface.
No signs of instability below treeline except for an isolated wind drift in an obviously drifted area. A test pit on an ENE aspect produced a hard, non-propagating failure (ECTN26) on small, rounding facets about 75 cm deep.

Date of Observation: 02/28/2023
Name: billy barr

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Gothic townsite

Observed avalanche activity: No
Weather: The wind continues to be the predominant weather feature holding steady and strong 10-15 westerly with gusts to 25. Only light but steady snow through the night with 3″ new and water 0.24″. Currently very light snowfall with no visibility and 64″ of snow on the ground as the wind shows no sign of letting up. Ever. Temperatures hold mild with a high of 26F yesterday and low today 14 with the current 16. Lots of snow transport- break a trail and turn around and it is gone. billy

Date of Observation: 02/27/2023
Name: Ben Pritchett and Eric Murrow

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Hunter Creek

Observed avalanche activity: No
Snowpack: The snowpack easily supported the weight of our sleds on most features, on many aspects and elevations. The only places we found a mostly weak snowpack were a) below 9,500′ in the valley bottom, b) a very shallow wind-swept spot on a ridge where we punched through the surface slab, c) and odd patches of weak snow near trees or creeks.
We could not find full-depth faceted areas like what has been reported on the steep-walled valleys on the north side of the Elk Mountains.
We found 140-160cm of snow at valley bottom in middle Cement Creek at 10,200′; 170-190cm near treeline; and up to 300cm in alpine features with cross-loading.
The layer of facets buried around Valentines lurked around 30 to 40cm deep, generally 4-finger stiff. Only where we targeted a shallow-depth south-facing spot did we elicit a hard propagating test result. Otherwise tests did not propagate. We experienced no collapsing or cracking. The slab on this upper-snowpack weak layer was 1-finger to pencil hard in wind-drifted areas, and 4-finger hard in wind-sheltered spots.

Date of Observation: 02/27/2023
Name: Zach Guy

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: Traversed from Ohio Pass through the Playground to the south side of the Anthracite Range to Beaver Ponds, traveling on various aspects to 11,500′

Observed avalanche activity: No
Avalanches: A few minor loose dry avalanches in the fresh snow. Eric spotted a few small wind slabs in the Whetstone area this morning.
Weather: Mostly cloudy, with a few flurries with minimal accumulation and light winds. About 4″ of new snow past 24 hours.
Snowpack: Hunting for persistent slab issues today in terrain features that might hold weaker or more developed facets in the upper snowpack. Test results on a wind-exposed northerly facing slope near treeline did not produce any notable results (ECTN) on small-grained facets about 2 feet deep. On an east-facing slope near treeline, I got hard, propagating results on a layer of small-grained facets (.3mm, 4F, rounding) about 2 feet deep, below a 4F+ slab. We did not experience any signs of instability throughout the tour, with ski and skinning traffic on similar types of slopes.
Snow surfaces are currently fairly low-density precip particles (~10%) that got moist on the sunniest aspects BTL.

Date of Observation: 02/26/2023
Name: Zach Guy

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Targeting below treeline terrain in the shallowest parts of our forecast area. Looked at the snowpack on various aspects of Red Mountain and Point Lookout to about 9,800′

Observed avalanche activity: No
Weather: An inch or two of new snow fell today. I observed some light drifting on open, below treeline slopes.
Snowpack: I traveled in areas where the snowpack is less than about 4 feet deep. The slab is generally faceted, but I was able to produce one unstable result on deep weak layers (the 12/20 facet layer, below a 4F 80cm slab). The upper snowpack also has weak layers of concern, the largest and most developed is the late January facet layer, which is only buried 25 cm or less. I got a mix of propagating and non-propagating results on this layer, the most reactive results were on an ESE aspect. The slab above that layer is lacking or not well developed in most terrain, but this could be more of an issue with additional snowfall.

Date of Observation: 02/25/2023

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: Skinning under a benched ridge line.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Weather: Mostly sunny

Date of Observation: 02/25/2023
Name: Rob Strickland

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: PBR

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Small wind slab: ATL > east
Weather: Delightful
Snowpack: Deep, calm, and warming

Date of Observation: 02/25/2023
Name: Eric Murrow

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Recreational day out Upper Cement Creek/Brush Creek

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: One recent natural avalanche on the northeast side of Double Top. The north Bowl on Cement Mountain had debris in the basin but the crown looked well drifted in (see photo). The northeast cirque on Carbon Peak had suspicious-looking crown markings but the photo was inconclusive (see photo).  No other obvious large avalanches were observed looking into SE mountains from the head of Hunter Creek.
Weather: Thin high clouds, mild air temps, and moderate winds above treeline.
Snowpack: Solar aspects became moist at mid to low elevations by the afternoon; some roller ball activity. Recent storm totals settled to around 10-12 inches at the head of Hunter Creek.

Date of Observation: 02/16/2023
Name: Evan Ross

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: Washington Gulch. 10,000 to 12,600

Observed avalanche activity: No
Avalanches: Any old wind slab or storm slab avalanches from last week have been blown back over. No notable natural avalanches stood out.
Weather: Overcast to mostly cloudy with thin high clouds most of the day. Clearing in the later afternoon. Consistent moderate winds above 11,500ft, that also tapered off in the later afternoon.
Snowpack: The alpine consisted of some monster drifts, loaded planner bowls with good-looking snow, and exfoliated crusts. When we moved through old wind slabs they felt stubborn. We avoided the biggest loaded terrain features. In the afternoon snow surfaces on west were moist at 11,000ft. Later noticed roller balls on SW and W from similar elevations and lower. A test pit on a 30-degree west-facing slope at 10,500ft had a layer of NSF down 45cm that produced a hard ECTN result.

Date of Observation: 02/25/2023
Name: Andrew Breibart

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Washington Gulch TH-Snowcross course next to the road-standard skin track to First Bowl.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Observed two small avalanches (D0.5-D1) below cornices on Skooks. These were likely observed in obs from 2/24/23.
Weather: calm in the valley bottom and within the trees with a light wind on the ridge line. Mostly cloudy and temperatures were very warm except on the ridge line in the light wind.
Snowpack: On the lower uptrack observed very small roller balls traveling less than 30 feet on >20 degree slope on one open area. Ventured off the skin track and had no cracking or collapsing. I kicked off very small roller balls that traveled less than 30 feet in this area on open terrain >20 degrees. There was no entrainment of snow from any of the rollerballs.
Riding snow was about 6 inches deep (15 cm deep) on south side of first bowl (NE aspect). Snow was warming quickly. On the ridge, I scraped patches of snow from my skis before the descent.
On the ski out, we talked to two skiers who skied Anthracite Mesa south of Coneys and across from Snodgrass T.H. They said snow clumped up to a few inches on their skis during their descent. They were still scraping snow when we passed them on the skin out.