Avalanches: Most paths around town ran naturally yesterday as soft slabs, on the storm interface or to the ground, 2-3 feet deep on, east through north aspects below treeline, one on a northwest aspect near treeline. D1.5 to D2 in size, some wide propagation. Most, if not all of these paths also ran during the December cycle, so their structure prior to this storm was shallow and fully faceted. Roughly 25 slides on Gibsons Ridge, Unemployment Chutes, above Peanut Lake Road, Happy Chutes, Whetstone, and the smaller slopes enroute to Mt. CB, etc. SS-N-R2/3-D1.5/2-I/O. Also a natural D1.5 soft slab in Red Lady Bowl, SE aspect ATL.
Weather:
Snowpack:

Gibson Ridge

Above Peanut Lake Road

Whetstone

Gibson Ridge

Gibson Ridge

Gibson Ridge

Washington Gulch

Avalanches: Sadly, as of mid morning yesterday, no slides on Snodgrass between Gothic and town. Visibility was bad but all i could see were a few surface sluffs of just new snow and not running far. Gothic, with the steep cliffs, was running constantly. –Good set up overnight with cooler temp. and substantial settling and no wind which should help. billy
Weather:
Snowpack: Total for the past 24 hours is 9½” and water of 0.58″ but it came in periods of 6″ Monday morning but with just 0.31″ water, then 3″ more in the afternoon with 0.24″ water and then just ½” last night (0.04″ water). Snow depth reached 65½” deep but settled to 62″ overnight. Little wind.

Avalanches: Just about Every West Aspect over 30 degrees went natural to some degrees, sometime in the early morning of Feb 1st . L-N-R1-D1.5-S. Some ran full track with debris running through the flats and powder blast 6’ up trees.
Re-Up East: small slide by the rock jumps put small debris pile on the road, No crown visible, began by upper 2 rocks
Only 2 Slab avalanches observed: Pacos way Left: SS-N-R1-D1-S Estimated from far: 12-20” deep, 100’ wide ran 300’. Released by the base of small trees. Sunny Shoulder: SS-ASc-R1-D1.5-S 12-20” Deep, 80’ wide ran 400’ ran in the storm snow 15cm’s above Jan 29th crust. Broke on classic convexity.
Weather: Overcast to Obscured and Snowing most of the day. High temp 23F/16F. Winds were pretty light most of the day and picked up a little bit at sunset.
Snowpack: Storm board at 33″ (2.75 SWE) 6″ fell during the day. 11″ overnight. Winds have been super kind and barely a slab to be found out there so far. Loose snow and sluffing have been touchy and running in storm snow above the crust.

Avalanches: See video.  Widespread natural storm slab instability on all aspects, mostly shallow and D1 to D1.5, but a few failing deeper and/or running long and far up to D2 in size (like the slides onto Kebler Road from 7 Sisters, where debris piles were 6 feet deep on the road). SS-N-R1-D1/D2-S.
We remotely triggered and observed several similar naturals failing on either surface hoar layers or near surface facet layers at the storm interface up to 3 feet deep. SS-N/ASr-R2-D1.5/2-I. These were on E and NE aspects BTL.
Weather: Intense pulse of heavy snowfall (S5) ended around 9 a.m., with S-1 through the rest of the morning. Calm winds. Overcast skies.
Snowpack: About 30″ of storm snow, fist hard. Ski pen was mid thigh. Widespread muffled collapses and shooting cracks on low angled terrain, where the storm snow sits on a thin melt-freeze crust (2cm), or on facets or surface hoar. Steep south aspects hold a 10cm thick meltfreeze crust below the storm snow.

Remotely triggered slide, failed on surface hoar 3 feet deep. SS-ASr-R2-D2-I. E aspect BTL Interestingly, this path had also run a few hours earlier as a shallow storm slab. It ran again, much deeper down to the storm interface as we approached it.

Widespread shallow storm slabs ran naturally on all aspects, but put debris down along Kebler Pass Road in a number of places.

Widespread shallow storm slabs ran naturally on all aspects, but put debris down along Kebler Pass Road in a number of places.

Widespread shallow storm slabs ran naturally on all aspects, W, SW aspects BTL shown here

Crown of remotely triggered slide. Failed on surface hoar, 30″ deep. (1/29 interface)

Natural soft slab on 1/29 interface. East aspect below treeline. Either failed on facets or surface hoar. SS-N-R2-D1.5-I

Impressive propagation for a shallow storm slab

Avalanches: See video. Counted about a dozen natural avalanches in steep terrain, running far, and all looking to break near or below new snow/old snow interface on small grained facets. Not on weakest depth hoar near ground. Investigated one slide, 50cm deep, running this morning. Steep (42º), east facing, below 29th meltfreeze layer. Interestingly enough, did not observe any avalanches on northerly facing terrain. Also observed 2 slides, east-southeast facing running on hillside across from cement creek ranch, with soft slab debris running across road.
Weather: Mild, humid, light snow S1 all afternoon, S1+ at times. Light WSW winds up valley 1300-1600, noticeably colder last hour or so, temperature on car dropped from 31 to 19 in few hours.
Snowpack: New snow 15-20,” deeper farther up valley. 1-2″ inches new accumulation between 1300-1600. Light to moderate winds were transporting snow in more exposed areas. Only travelled below treeline today, on southerly facing slopes. Booming collapses, cracking, easy to initiate fractures and small slabs on steep features.

20160201cementslide1

20160201cementsign

20160201cementpillows

Remotely triggered pockets on small rollovers, and booming collapses.

Failed in old facet layers below storm snow, a crust layer, and thin “midpack”. Probaly Jan 14 layer.

Natural on E aspect BTL

Natural that hit Cement Creek Road

Naturals along HWY 135. East aspect BTL

Naturals, SE aspect BTL

Avalanches: Notable avalanche results from AC work today in Teo Bowl (right) and Phoenix Bowl.
Teo Bowl:
Out of Sight / Mind – 11,800’ East aspect, 40 deg. Slope. Typical wind loaded lens. 4# Air Blast. SS-AE-R2-D2-S Width 25m, Vert fall 125m
Soil yer shorts – 11,500’ E/SE aspect, 40 deg. Slope at start zone, outside of our current boundary, no skier traffic, effective previous AC work). SS-AE-R3-D2-G Width 25m, Vert fall 150m.
Wolf’s Lair – 11,325’ E/NE aspect, 40 deg slope. Previously open, but little to no skier traffic under cliffs at start zone. SS-AE-R3-D2-G Width 150m, Vert fall 150m
Land of Many Names – 11,250’ E/NE Aspect, Slope 40 deg. At start zone. Outside of our current boundary, no skier traffic, previous natural activity observed 12/27. SS-ASr-R3-D2-I Width 200m, Vert Fall 150m. Remote trigger by skier in flats, 20m from start zone.

Phoenix Bowl:
Low Exit – 10,500’ NE Aspect, Slope 40 deg. This area was in an area not yet open to public, no skier compaction, previous explosives work. SS-AS-R1-D1-O/G Width 20m, Vert fall 150m. Triggered with ski cut, took patroller for a ride, lost a ski, bruised thigh, partially buried.
Weather:
Snowpack:

Weather: Moderate snowfall all day S-2, very light SE winds aven at tree line and ridgetop. Suprising. Temps dropped as we climbed from -6°C at 10,000 to -8°C at 11,800.
Snowpack: 35-45cms of new snow over crusts and NSFs. Right side up snowfall with an instability noted in the top 3 cm which wanted to run off on steeper stuff. Crust was very stout in some areas, breaker in others.
1 small collapse noted on the way up near a large solo tree. Likely the intermittent crust in the area breaking. Jumping on small cornices at the 11,500 ridge produced only minor slufing on the steep E facing slope. There may have been a natural on the slope, but poor vis limited ob. No other signs of instability on slopes up to 32°

Avalanches:
Weather: Light snow Sunday picking up just after dark. Steady moderate to heavy snow overnight with currently moderate snow and obscured cloud cover. This is for 5:30 (sweep time is 7 and i will update about 7:30 depending on how many days it takes me to ski to the office). There was 4″ yesterday and 11½” so far last night so 15½” new with total water and even 1.00″ water- still holding above average density. Snow pack at the winters deepest 60″. No wind (thankfully) and no visibilty.

More at 7:30 or so. billy
Snowpack:

Avalanches: SS-N-R1/2-D/1.5/2-U. Observed to avalanches failing naturally around 1pm on ENE aspects at 9,300ft. SS-ASc-R2-D2-O, SS-ASc-R1-D1-O, triggered two other slabs on Easterly aspects, one failing over a crust facet crust sandwich on a road cut and the other failing on a thin persistent slab formed in January.
Weather: Snowing lightly all day, mostly S1. No wind and no evidence of wind from last night in the valley bottom.
Snowpack: 13-14″ new overnight in Gothic and about 10-12″ closer to the snodgrass trailhead. Shovel tilt tests would produce failures mid storm on graupel, we never found enough slab in this storm snow to propagate into anything.

Where this storm snow was resting over fist hard weak facets there wasn’t any significant avalanche problem, yet. Where the storm snow was adding weight to older persistent weak layers, they were being overloaded and aiding in propagation. We observed some scary crust facet crust sandwiches on south and sunny east slopes formed during the small mid-January storms. Or decaying thin persistent slabs on other easterly aspects. Both of these oder persistent weak layers aided in propagation and we could easily trigger slabs on road cuts or steep slopes with this snowpack structure.

SS-ASc-R2-D2-O Human triggered D2 slab failing in persistent weak layers formed mid January. 2 other natural slabs that failed around 1pm could be seen further down valley

Small road cut, soft slab was human triggered and failed on a crust facet crust sandwich formed earlier in January.

Avalanches:
Weather: Y’all saw it, warm dumptown cooling in afternoon. Little to no wind.
Snowpack: HS on Snodgrass 155cm at 10k ENE. 35-45cm new right side up but the grauple it rests upon reacts easily (CTE). Snodgrass team observed 2 SH layers 45 and 51cms from the surface but they did not propagate on ECT testing. Generally F-4F-F structure on Snodgrass. At 10,100 ENE we did observe spidering cracks on a 41degree convex slope triggered from a recent skin track propagating 150 feet. It did not run but was a solid teachable moment for the youths.
Smith Hill reported widespread and repeated collapses throughout the entire tour, particularly when multiple people were stacked closely.