Observations

Date of Observation: 02/23/2022
Name: Chris Martin

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Classic Red Lady Glades Skin track from parking lot to exposed ridge before summit. We descended Skiers left of Little Lady bowl avoiding avalanche terrain.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Ascending the red lady skintrack, at about 11,250’, we remotely triggered a D2.5 soft slab avalanche on a windloaded E-SE facing slope NTL and below a ridgetop. The crown was 50-100cm thick, and propagated an estimated 200 ft. The slab was 4F hardness near the bottom tapering to F hard near the surface. We also noticed a dust later near the bottom of the storm snow. The bed surface was small grained (1-1.5mm facets) on top of a soft, collapsible crust. There were also small grained facets below the crust too.
Weather: Scattered clouds throughout the morning with intermittent periods of sunlight. Around noon, cloud cover increased to overcast as SW wind speeds also increased. Precipitation intensity hovered around S-1 to S1 during our tour (ended at 1:30).
Snowpack: At lower elevations, there was 6-10” of low density new snow. As we ascended in elevation, we found 8-17” of slab on top of various dry weak layers. Ascending on south, the slab capped a stout MfCr. As the aspect became more southeast and east, crusts become weaker and softer, unable to support the load from this storm on lee slopes. On low angle south terrain, we got a handful of collapses in gladed areas that simply don’t receive enough direct sunlight to produce a stout crust.

Photos:

5382

Date of Observation: 02/23/2022
Name: Kevin Krill

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: Observed from Mike’s mile nordic trail.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Widespread activity from the gronk all the way to gunsite bridge. R/D1 and D2 East of East of alien shack. R/D2 and D3 in the climax chutes. Debis covered nordic track 5 to 6′ deep for 200 yd. Is runout was just sigh of slate river
Weather: Brief clearing. Otherwise heavy snow.
Snowpack: A foot to 18″ fresh.

Photos:

5381

Date of Observation: 02/23/2022
Name: Rob Strickland

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: More skin track maintenance… Glady.
The trail is in good shape.
Made sure to give the East shot on ascent before ridge line a wide birth. I don’t think that has popped yet… also gave cornices a wide margin.

Observed avalanche activity: No
Avalanches: East shots filled in today. Lots of collapses in low angle S/SE; some cracking and rippling from skier weight on decent, but too low angle to move.
Weather: S2 about 1”/hr while touring.
Snowpack: Getting deeper!
Cornices are back after dropping them yesterday…
Ski pen +/- 8”; storm snow +/- 18” NTL

5380

Date of Observation: 02/23/2022
Name: Jeff Writer

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Skinned up Walrod

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Slide path just above Caves loop trailhead went last night, buried road with ~15 feet of snow.

5379

Date of Observation: 02/23/2022
Name: billy barr

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Gothic townsite

Observed avalanche activity: No
Weather: Obscured cloud cover with light wind, though gusting at times. Snow paused yesterday from mid morning to mid afternoon but picked up after dark with the heaviest coming in the last 2 hours. New snow of 8″ and water of 0.66″. Snowpack is up to 57″. Currently light to moderate snow with little wind but the gusts make it (and me for that matter) nasty. Current temperature a moderate 17F. No visible slide activity but then no visible anything.

5378

Date of Observation: 02/23/2022
Name: Cosmo Langsfeld

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Cement Creek Ranch

Observed avalanche activity: No
Avalanches:
Weather: ~4.5 inches in the last 24 hours
Snowpack:

5377

Date of Observation: 02/22/2022
Name: Irwin Guides

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: Irwin Tenure

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: SS-ASr-R1-D1-O W aspect BTL 10-13″ X 50′ X 150′ triggered from 50′ away (Strike
Three).
SS-ASr-R1-D1.5-O E aspect NTL 14-16″ X 150′ X 250′ triggered from the flat ridge above ( Sonic/ Pre
evac).
Numerous small D1’s W BTL
Weather:
Snowpack:

5375

Date of Observation: 02/22/2022
Name: Rob Strickland

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Standard maintenance lap up the lady

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: NTL and ATL east facing slopes were primed and mostly popped naturally.
Cornice drop with moderate propagation R2D2.
Lots of collapses and cracks near skis on ascent.
Weather: Partly cloudy S1 at times.
Breezy NTL.
Snowpack: 5” – 8” new
14” – 24”+ in wind loaded terrain

Photos:

5374

Date of Observation: 02/22/2022
Name: Zach Guy and Zach Kinler

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: Schuylkill Ridge to 11,400 ft, traveled mostly on NE aspects.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Wowza. Brief window of vis this afternoon displayed widespread natural slab activity on the steep NE facing rollers below the bench (BTL); counted at least 20 slabs mostly D1 to D1.5 and a few D2s. Slabs consistently were about a foot thick breaking on the “2022 total BS drought sandbox layer” (named by Evan). We had limited views of NTL slopes, but the 3 start zones that we could see all produced large avalanches. The most impressive was Thanksgiving Bowl which ran past the bench and snapped trees, D2.5 in size. Slabs near treeline were about 18″ thick. We skier triggered about 10 slab avalanches; these were all small in size because we were working small terrain features. Some were remotely triggered from short distances, most were triggered with ski cuts.
Weather: Light snowfall through most of the day, with rates increasing around 3 p.m. A brief period of greenhouse effect midday, otherwise overcast or obscured all day. Winds were surprisingly light at ridgetop with light drifting.
Snowpack: We traveled mostly in dense canopy, where the slab/weak layer combo didn’t seem to be an issue. Almost every opening or clearing that we touched produced a rumbling collapse and shooting cracks on slopes less than 36 degrees or so, or avalanched on slopes steeper than that.  Slabs were 12″ to 18″ thick over the well-advertised weak layer. At 10,000′, we measured 12″ (1.0″ SWE) storm snow, and 15″ (1.4″ SWE) down to the facets. On some low angle, southwest facing ridge walking, we got several collapses in wind whales that were a couple feet thick behind tree fences.

Photos:

5373

Date of Observation: 02/22/2022
Name: Ben Ammon

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: North and Northeast facing terrain above Gothic Road

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Numerous 25cm deep soft slabs running on the old snow surface, which was 1-1.5mm FC. Any terrain steeper than 35 degrees ran naturally or was touchy to ski triggers. The largest slide observed was about 300′ wide and ran onto Gothic Road sometime around 1pm, between our first and second laps, D1.5, photos attached. Similar terrain in less sheltered areas where the old snow surface was a variable mix of windboard and facets produced some cracking but was much more stubborn or wouldn’t slide at all.
Snowpack: HST at 1500 was 25cm

Photos:

5371