Date of Observation: 02/14/2021
Name: Cam Smith
Zone: Southeast Mountains
Avalanches:
Weather: 4” on the semi-official Brush Creek snowstake
Snowpack:
Photos:
First light whetstone avalanches
Date of Observation: 02/13/2021
Name: Eric Murrow
Zone: Southeast Mountains
Location: Whetstone Mountain
Aspect: East
Avalanches: Around 8am two fresh avalanches were visible. A broad and deep avalanche on drifted near treeline east aspect…lots of ground showing in bed surface- D2.5. Another Persistent slab below treeline on an open east-facing slopes D1.5.
Photos:
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- A wide and deep avalanche on a drifted near treeline, east-facing slope.
Spooky Quiet
Date of Observation: 02/13/2021
Zone: Southeast Mountains
Location: Snodgrass East/Northeast line
Aspect: North East, East
Elevation: 9000-11100
Avalanches: No observed, saw evidence of slides from previous day; could only find one trigger point that produced a small collapse.
Weather: Low vis, S1 in the morning, moving to S2 by afternoon. No wind. Temperature in the high 20s.
Snowpack: About 2-3 feet of snow from the last two weeks at F-F+ hardness, which sat on top of a 2-3 inch P- 1F hard layer, which sat on about at least a foot of large grained facets.
Piling up
Date of Observation: 02/13/2021
Name: Zach Guy
Zone: Northwest Mountains
Location: Anthracite Mesa
Aspect: South West, West
Elevation: 9500 – 11200′
Avalanches: Limited visibility but we spotted a handful of natural slab avalanches that ran in the past 24 hours. A number of D1 to D2s below treeline (most appeared to be persistent slabs). Several larger ones off of Schuykill Ridge, I believe at least one more D3 that snapped trees and hit the valley floor from the “Great Wide Open”. Light was too flat to see crown but debris looked fresh.
Weather: Snowfall started around noon – moderate to heavy (S2 to S5) throughout the rest of the day. About 4″ or 5″ of accumulation by sunset. Light ridgetop winds with moderate gusts and some light snow transport. Winds were channeling up valley out of the south.
Snowpack: About 20″ of storm snow since Friday morning. We only observed a few signs of instability underfoot, but they were quite alarming: huge collapses and shooting cracks opening up hundreds of feet away. Test pit on a southwest aspect at 10,300′ showed hard propagating results at the 2/3 crust and 1/19 crust/facet layer. The latter is three feet deep. The 12/10 layer was about 5 feet deep, and sadly, still fist hard. Crappy structure, even for a deeper snowpack.
Photos:
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- Snow pit on SW aspect showing propagating results on several deep layers
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- We remotely triggered this shooting crack from over a hundred yards away and from below the slope
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- D2, E BTL above Slate River
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- Fresh slabs on Schuylkill Ridge
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- Fresh slabs on Schuylkill Ridge
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- D1 slab near Happy Chutes (NE, BTL)
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- D1.5 slab above Peanut Lake Road (NE, BTL)
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- Recent slabs above the Slate River, D2, E/NE NTL
Cement Creek
Date of Observation: 02/13/2021
Zone: Southeast Mountains
Location: Cement Creek Road
Aspect: South East
Avalanches: Toured out Cement Creek road. D2 avalanche ran from ridge and stopped just after crossing road. Some broken trees. Ran 1500 ft? Road is passable over debris.
Weather: Snow and blowing snow.
Photos:
Washington Gulch-Coneys
Date of Observation: 02/13/2021
Name: Andrew Breibart
Zone: Southeast Mountains
Location: Washington Gulch-Coneys
Aspect: North East, East
Elevation: BTL
Avalanches: Observed at least 4 distinct avalanches ranging in D0.5 to D2 between Meridian Lake and the Long Lake T.H. See pictures. These are natural avalanches that appear to have triggered between 02/12/21 and 02/13/21. The one closest to Meridian Lakes appears to have failed on basal facets.
Weather: Obscured skies and light winds at all elevations. S2 to S3 snowfall.
At the car, visibility was minimal and could not see avalanches observed from the road at 10:15 AM.
Snowpack: Ski pen off the skin track in an open are 1/2 the way up was about 12 inches. Underneath new snow, felt a slab 6 to 8 inches deep with faceted grains below (ski pole probe). No cracking or collapsing in this area.
Along the ridge, both of us stomped on terrain between first bowl and our line with no cracking or collapsing. Ski pole probin didn’t find faceted grains. Beneath the new snow, it took a lot of force to penetrate below the new snow. This was a localized probing.
Photos:
Avalanches above Gothic
Date of Observation: 02/13/2021
Name: Zach Guy
Zone: Southeast Mountains
Location: Gothic Peak
Aspect: East
Elevation: N/BTL
Avalanches: About 10 fresh avalanches off of Gothic Peak visible on billy barr’s webcam this morning. They look like persistent slabs, D2+ in size.
Comments from caretakers in Gothic: “They all made it down to where the terrain flattens out. Some of them broke trees. Also a big section of the E Face ran to bare ground”
Photos:
Gothic 7 a.m.
Date of Observation: 02/13/2021
Name: billy barr
Zone: Southeast Mountains
Location: Gothic
Snowpack: Steady snow through Friday morning with 4½’ by mid day when snow stopped until just after dark, then steady all night until near 4 a.m. Some afternoon wind moved snow around as well. The 24 hour snow total was 11″ new with 1.01″ of water as the snowpack has reached 52″ deep. Temp. held mild with a high of 29F and this morning’s low and current of 20F. Currently overcast with a light W wind and a few flakes just starting to fall. Conditions are very unstable (and after 4 weeks now of cloudy weather, wouldn’t you be as well?). billy
A few naturals seen from Gothic
Date of Observation: 02/13/2021
Name: Alex Tiberio
Zone: Southeast Mountains
Aspect: North East, East
Avalanches: A few naturals ran during last nights snow propagating widely
Photos:
Crested Butte snowpack structure
Date of Observation: 02/12/2021
Name: Jared Berman, Jack Caprio, Zach Kinler, Zach Guy
Zone: Southeast Mountains
Location: Zone A and Zone C paths near downtown Crested Butte
Aspect: East, North West
Elevation: 9,000′
Snowpack: Looked at two snowpits to observe snowpack structure adjacent to municipal start zones. Both showed unstable structures with moderate propagating results below 45 to 70 cm slabs.
Pit 1 was dug on the west end of Elk Ave (Zone A)
Pit 2 was dug on the west end of Red Lady Ave (Zone C)
See snow profiles in photos.
Photos:
