Name: Gary Dotzler
Title: Wet slide
Location: Crested Butte Area
Date of Observation: 01/07/2015
Aspect: South
Elevation: 11,500-10,000

Avalanches: This’s so a wet slide that probably came down 1/6/15 in the copper creek drainage. Might have been a bit scary watching this come down as we are standing on the trail. Hot today, 40f, and yesterday when it probably slid it was a record high at 42f. Cliff side looked like spring instead of dead winter, with numerous wet slide evidence.

Weather: Clear, 40f

Snowpack: Clumpy snow, occasional collaspe

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Name: Gary Dotzler
Title: Deer triggered avalanche
Location: Crested Butte Area
Date of Observation: 01/07/2015
Aspect: North
Elevation: 10000

Avalanches: Found this small slide about a mile from Gothic townsite on copper creek. North facing about 30 ft across. Only ran 30 ft to the creek. What is interesting about it is it was most likely triggered by a couple mule deer (we found some scat to confirm).

Weather: Clear, 40F

Snowpack:

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Name: Zach Guy
Title: Irwin Tenure
Location: Kebler Pass Area
Date of Observation: 01/07/2015
Aspect: West
Elevation: 11,400 ft

Avalanches:

Weather: High of 42F at 10,000 ft. Few clouds, calm winds.

Snowpack: Snow profile dug in an undisturbed area, west facing slope near treeline showed a rounding snowpack, with a mix of propagating and non-propagating results in the facet layer below the Nov 22 crust in PST and ECTs. Dec 13th facet layer showing significant improvements, not reactive in any stability tests. Surface was a mix of wind crusts and melt freeze crusts.

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Name: Matt Zia
Title: Snodgrass pits
Location: Crested Butte Area
Date of Observation: 01/07/2015
Aspect: North East
Elevation: 9600

Avalanches: Observed natural avalanche activity across the valley on the S Face of Avery Peak (~10,000 feet and maybe 40º slope?) as well as on W facing slopes further south (approximately same elevation and angle as Avery) . Too far to really see, but appeared to be loose wet snow, no noticeable crown or slab fracturing.

Weather: Clear skies, no wind, ~40ºF in the sun, 30ºF in shade

Snowpack: Approximately 20º slope, NE facing at 9600 feet. Small meadow just off the Snodgrass road and above a large rollover.

0-5cm: Surface hoar, approx. 2.5mm grain size, F hardness, some rollerballs from digging a pit
5-50cm: consolidated slab, 4F-1F hardness
50-55cm: December 13th weak layer, 1-2mm facets
55-90cm: 1F hardness
90-95cm (ground): F hardness, facets and depth hoar

Conducted two compression tests, both failed at December 13th layer. First: CT22-SC-Q1. Second: CT21-SC-Q1. Top 10cm of snow easily disintegrated under shovel blade.

Crossed paths with another party who dug a pit higher up on a steeper slope of 35º. They found a similar snowpack in terms of depth, but compression test yielded a result of CT7. Additionally, on the steeper terrain, the top 10cm which disintegrated on a 20º slope instead slide as its own slab before the thicker slab reacted on the December 13th interface.

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Name: Zach Guy
Title: Natural slides
Location: Kebler Pass Area
Date of Observation: 01/06/2015
Aspect: East, South East, South, South West, West
Elevation: Near and above treeline

Avalanches: 2 Natural windslabs in the past couple days, one off of the east face of Owen, one off of a Northeast couloir on Scarp’s Ridge, ATL slopes. Both looked to be about a foot deep, relatively small, less than 40 feet wide. (SS-N-R1-D1-I).  Over a dozen wet loose avalanches on south aspects near treeline in Peeler and Robinson Basin, D1 to D1.5 in size.  Some of these showed some horizontal propagation as they ran.  WL-N-R1-D1/1.5-S.   One wet loose triggered a larger slab, estimated about 2 feet deep on the Dec 13th crust.  SS-NL-R2-D2-O.

Weather: Light westerly winds. WARM. High of 40F at 10,000 ft. Few clouds.

Snowpack: New surface hoar layer, preserved on low angle slopes that didn’t get cooked by the sun. Snowpack became moist with lots of rollerballs on SE to S to W aspects on near treeline slopes, and S aspects above treeline.

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Title: Avalanches on Snodgrass
Location: Crested Butte Area
Date of Observation: 01/06/2015
Aspect: South East
Elevation: ~11,000 ft

Avalanches: 2 minor slides on the Southeast Aspect (California Bowl) of Snodgrass. Nobody was hurt.

Weather: Warm and sunny

Snowpack: Heavy and wet

Name: Travis Colbert
Title: Lower Wolverine Basin
Location: Crested Butte Area
Date of Observation: 01/06/2015
Aspect: North West
Elevation: 10,600

Avalanches:

Weather: Warm (30 degrees), low cloud layer in the Slate River valley, clear blue skies above. Calm winds.

Snowpack: Test pit on a 38 degree rocky rollover. 110 cm total snow depth. 52 cm of fist to four finger soft snow on top of “December 13th interface” of 1-2 mm facets. 20-30 cm of two and three finger hardness below December 13th interface sitting on 10 cm of 2-3 mm facets at the ground. Conducted several shovel compression test with widely mixed results from CT7 with a sudden collapse on the December 13th interface to CT30 that shovel sheared at the ground. One of the columns failed when cutting on the December 13th interface. Rock outcroppings in the vicinity of the test pit seemed to be contributing to the widely varied results. Bottom line, while much of the snowpack might be “MODERATE”, there seems to be plenty of sensitive pockets that can be easily triggered by the weight of a skier.

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Name: Evan Ross
Date: 1/16/15
Location: Snodgrass Road
Aspect: NE

Weather: Low clouds and overcast this morning. Burning off by 11am to few clouds. Much warmer then that past week.

Snowpack/Avalanche Obs: Passing by NE side of snodgrass on the Gothic road.  Certainly a widespread Persistent Slab cycle on the mid and upper slopes of Snodgrass. Classic avalanche terrain generally over 34 degrees was a main characteristic. Lots of wind effect in the east river valley. Looked like more wind stripping then wind loading, but obviously there were some cross loaded pockets too. Lots of loosing snow avalanching on sunny slopes but all d1-d1.5.