Location: Crested Butte Area
Date of Observation: 03/26/2020
Name: Eric Murrow
Subject: Lots of avalanches from wind event

Avalanches:Numerous large and very large avalanches in near and above treeline terrain. Many appeared to have been triggered by cornice fall yesterday evening, last night, and this morning. See photos for a tour.
Whetstone – Main Bowl D2, 2x Hidden Lake Bowl, D2 & D3
Baldy – Nirvana Bowl, D2.5
Schuylkill Ridge – D2
Angle Pass- D2
Gothic – 2x East Face, D3
Mt Emmons – Wolverine, D2
Scarp Ridge – 4x D3, 2x D2
Western Basin in Anthracite Range – 2x D2.5

Photos:

Location: Paradise Divide Area
Date of Observation: 03/25/2020
Name: Lee
Subject: Gothic megatour
Aspect: North, North East, East
Elevation: 10000 and above

Avalanches: Many. 500 foot crown on ne baldy, ~2 ft deep, on emerald couloir headwall, 200 ft wide glide avvy that went to ground on the flank dividing emerald and Quigley. These slides occured somewhere around 9am
The northeast slide path on gothic ripped wall to wall around noon, leaving an extremely deep crown

Lots of wind effect but no slides in queens basin. Nachos cornice may be too large to enter the line now.

As I skied out white ridge, a massive cornice failure occured on ef gothic, ripping the fall line to dirt. 7pm

Didnt get many pictures, light wasn’t playing ball
Weather: Cloudy as, windy as

Snowpack: Extremely variable

Photos:

Location: Crested Butte Area
Date of Observation: 03/25/2020
Name: Evan Ross
Subject: Carbon Peak
Aspect: North, North East, East, South
Elevation: 9.500-12,000

Weather: Late afternoon outing. Mostly cloudy sky, warm temps, and lighter winds then expected. Around 4pm at an exposed 12,000ft the westerly winds were light to moderate.

Snowpack: This area represents one of the dryer portions of our forecast area. I mostly traveled on northerly facing slopes as everything else was crusty and not much fun to ride. So this summary is for northerly facing slopes. The Continental Snowpack here was very evident with a randomly punchy structure in some places. In general there was a weak slab over a weak layer of facets. Sometimes the snowpack felt strong as the snowpack was supportive, and other times you would punch through the slab and into the weak facets in the lower half of the snowpack. I spent plenty of time finding trigger points and punching into the weak layer with no signs to instability. Still that type of snowpack structure is hard to trust and I looked over my shoulder more than once.

Came across a small slab avalanche that failed within the last 24hrs. Some of the cracks above the crown had been drifted over, but everything else was fairly sharp. NE, 11,950ft SS-N-R1-D1.5-I. The slab was 30cm thick and F+ hard. It released on the 3/18 interface. That interface was a 2cm crust. ECT, CT, and PST tests were inconsistent and not effective given the thin and soft slab. Even pulling on the slab in hand pits was difficult to pull a cohesive column of snow off the curst. Slope angle was about 36 at the crown and the slope rolled over steeper below the crown. Of other particular note was how quickly the flanks tapered away. That was either due to the Stauchwall location, or from previous wind-loading. HS was 150cm.

Location: Crested Butte Area
Date of Observation: 03/25/2020
Name: Eric Murrow
Subject: Recent avalanches
Elevation: 8900 – 11400′

Avalanches: Two fresh deeper avalanches in Red Well basin. Both look to be triggered by cornice fall. One slide was present by 10am the other ran sometime after but before 1pm.
Some small Wet Loose avalanche activity noted – mostly pinwheels but a few accumulated mass.
Weather: Mostly cloudy skies and warm temperatures. Winds on a 11,400 ridgetop were light with occasional gusting to 20. High peaks had on and off flagging for much of the day loading onto easterly aspects.

Photos:

Location: Crested Butte Area
Date of Observation: 03/25/2020
Name: Zach Kinler
Subject: 3/25 Avalanche obs
Aspect: North, North East
Avalanches:

Axtel NE 11,800′ D1.5 Wind Slab
Whetstone NNE 11,800′ D2 Persistent Slab

Weather: Mostly Cloudy skies, Light westerly winds below tree line, temps remained cool in the 30s.

Snowpack: Snowpack at Elkton Study Plot was deepest of the year at 185cm. 3/18 interface is a thick 6 cm crust with 1mm rounding facets on top and is down 35 cm with 4F to 1F slab on top. CT 16 SC, ECTN28(crossed column on taps 29,30). All other interfaces have seen free water in this location.

Wind Slab NE 11,800′ Axtel

Persistent Slab 11,800′ NNE Whetstone

Location: Crested Butte Area
Date of Observation: 03/25/2020
Subject: RMBL Study Plot 3/25/2020

Photos:

Location: Crested Butte Area
Date of Observation: 03/24/2020
Name: Nick
Subject: Crown observed in California Bowl on Snodgrass
Aspect: North East
Elevation: 10,700

Avalanches: Observed a couple day old crown that showed signs of wind effect, approx 18in deep and spanning about 40 feet. Ski cutting hangfire produced a small slab pocket about 10ft x 10ft with an 18in crown. Looked to be on the old snow- new snow interface.

Weather: Sunny, partly cloudy

Photos:

Location: Kebler Pass Area
Date of Observation: 03/24/2020
Name: Evan Ross
Subject: Afternoon Look Around Kebler Pass Area

This is a story book observation. See photos and descriptions.

Location: Crested Butte Area
Date of Observation: 03/24/2020
Name: Whitney, Syd, and Cheese
Subject: M Face Avalanche – Whetstone
Aspect: North East

Avalanches: Large avalanche on M face of Whetstone! Up close. Skied the Summit bowl and it was awesome! Small signs of instability skinning up the ridge between Summit Bowl and M face, some cracking and one collapse. Beautiful Day!

Weather: Mostly sunny, intermittent clouds with L winds.

Location: Paradise Divide Area
Date of Observation: 03/24/2020
Name: Zach Kinler
Aspect: East, South East, South, South West, West
Elevation: 10,500′-12,000′
Avalanches:

No new avalanches observed

Weather: Pleasant day, Partly Cloudy skies, temperatures warming to near freezing. Calm to light breezes in sheltered areas with Light to moderate westerly wind near tree line.

Snowpack: 5″ new snow around 11K. Up to 11,500′ this snow became moist on the southern half of the compass. Above 11,500′ surfaces were mostly dry with increasing westerly winds transporting snow onto easterly aspects. Small drifted terrain features had deposits up to a foot deep with cracking from skis traveling 10-20 feet. Last week’s crust was around 60 cm below the surface. Avoided larger drifted features in this terrain. Once below 11,500′ warming surfaces limited available snow for transport with similar slopes producing no instabilities. Winds increased after 16:00 with moving snow visible on the highest peaks.

East aspect 11,800′

Moderate westerly winds were transporting snow onto leeward aspects

Winds increased by late in the afternoon moving available recent snow