Location: Paradise Divide Area
Date of Observation: 01/20/2019
Name: Eric Murrow
Subject: Quick below treeline check on SE up Wa Gulch
Aspect: South East, South
Elevation: 9,500 to 10,400
Avalanches:
Avalanche in Coon Basin on Mt. Emmons that a friend believed to not be there on Saturday, but noticed Sunday morning. East aspect R2D2 – crown appeared to be maybe 4ish feet deep but was very narrow contained between to shallow, pungy ribs.
Weather: Comfortable air temps with calm winds below treeline. At 430 looking back towards Treasury could see healthy flagging off of peak.
Snowpack: Poked a couple of holes on SE slopes to check on PSa problem BTL and found hard ECTP results in two locations, one was shallow at 94 cm and the other at a drifted location with 143cm. Both locations failed around the same crust level mid-pack but the shallower location failed below a crust on 1.5mm facets and the drifted location failed a the crust on 1mm facets. The deeper site had the same 1.5mm facets below the suspect crust but failed above it. Both locations had a very similar structure with the key difference that the shallow location just barely had 4f slab sandwiched in upper layers whereas the deeper location definitively had slab structure above the failure location. Was not able to get a collapse by jumping around at both locations.
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