Observations

Date of Observation: 01/23/2022
Name: Peter Horgan

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: We descended one of the chutes above Green Lake on the far looker’s left side of Axtel. Refer to the picture attached here.

Aspect: NNW
Elevation: ~11,500
Slope angle: ~45 degrees

Observed avalanche activity: No
Avalanches: No avalanches were observed. Given the current awareness/concern around sluff, I wanted to report that we did not have any sluffing at this location.
Snowpack: The snowpack was measured at 235cm near the bottom of the chute.

Photos:

5277

Date of Observation: 01/23/2022

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Viewed from Slate River Trailhead

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Skier triggered sluffs in Climax Chutes

Photos:

5275

Date of Observation: 01/24/2022
Name: Frank Stern

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Emmons and Climax areas, 9,000 to 11,000

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Loose snow N facing in easternmost Climax chute 10,000′, D1, looks like natural release, 2 further east natural, Wolverine Basin 11,500′ east facing
Weather: Sunny and calm
Snowpack: Solid

Photos:

5274

Date of Observation: 01/23/2022

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: 8,700-11,300 feet; SE, E & NE aspects.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: D1 loose wet avalanche on a rocky, east-facing slope. Picture is not the best, but looker’s left side of the start zone.
Weather: Single digits in the morning, warming into the 20s later in the day. Sunny and clear. Steady WNW wind was loading leeward slopes ATL.
Snowpack: Pole probing throughout the tour revealed an HS of 100-120cm. 5-10cm of new snow. Sheltered (BTL) NE terrain skied well. E & SE terrain exhibited varying levels of crusty-ness.

Photos:

5273

Date of Observation: 01/23/2022
Name: Zach Guy

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Gothic Mountain from Washington Gulch. Traveled on south through west aspects to 12,600 ft.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Skier triggered a shallow wet-ish loose sluff that ran about 900 vertical feet down a steep SW facing chute, small in size, but large enough to take you for a ride. There was a small natural loose dry that ran yesterday from an adjacent slope.
Weather: Gorgeous sunny day. Inverted temps. Light ridgetop winds, no snow transport observed anywhere in the zone.
Snowpack: Storm snow has settled to 2″ or 3″. We found isolated drifts up to 15″ thick along the summit ridge of Gothic from previous east winds blowing up the face. The drifts formed on rocks on west-facing terrain, so they weren’t a hazard here.
Further January weak layer documentation: The facets on south aspects are capped by a thick, stout crust with occasional percolation columns into the weak layer. There are small radiation recrystallization facets on the surface; I suspect they got cooked today? Westerly aspects look similar to east aspects from yesterday but with thinner or non-existent wind crusts capping the facets. Tested for deeper instabilities in a shallow west-facing slope and got unreactive results, although the basal weak layer was embedded in talus and not continuous across the pit.

Photos:

5272

Date of Observation: 01/22/2022
Name: Eric Murrow Ben Prichett

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Cement Creek to Flag Creek to Spring Creek to Taylor River Rd to Upper Taylor and back into Cement Creek. A good portion of this route was just outside the CBAC forecast area to the east.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Observed evidence of several unreported D3 avalanches from the major cycle at the end of December in Upper Taylor drainage, and one fresh Wind Slab avalanche on the north slopes of Mount Tilton, D1.5.
Weather: Clear skies and light to calm winds below treeline. Generally 1 to 3 inches of new snow from Friday’s small storm, with around 6 inches in the localized area near Upper Taylor Creek.
Snowpack: We measured snow depths in numerous places on this long snowmobile tour: 135cm in middle Cement Creek at 10,000′, 175cm in the headwaters of Cement Creek at 11,500′ near Hunter Creek, 110 cm near Spring Creek Reservoir at 9,900′, 135cm near the head of Spring Creek, and 90cm at the junction of Taylor Road and Taylor Pass Rd at 10,000′.

Photos:

5271

Date of Observation: 01/22/2022
Name: Andrew Breibart

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Red lady skin track to gunsight pass to Redwell to Wrong Chute to the OBJ CG

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: sloughs on scarp ridge-NE aspect ATL (see pictures)

Weather: calm, clear, and warm in the sun.

Snowpack: 2 inches of new snow within past 24 hours on south side on Mt Emmons. New snow lays on top of slick melt freeze crust. 6 to 8 inches of new snow within past 24 hours on the north side. Ski pen on the north side is mostly 4 to 5 inches and soft under foot. While skiing wrong chute, we released fast moving sluffs below the road in steeper terrrain. We observed sluffs along Scarp Ridge which occurred within the past 24 hours (see pictures).

Photos:

5270

Date of Observation: 01/22/2022
Name: Zach Guy and Evan Ross

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: Traveled on easterly and southerly aspects in Poverty Gulch to 12,500 ft.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Numerous loose snow avalanches in the new snow ran today or yesterday, most were very small. A few ran far enough/ gained enough volume to pose a hazard in consequential terrain, D1 in size. We skier triggered a handful of similar sluffs, along with a few of a wetter variety on sunnier aspects. Near mountain top, we triggered a few small soft slabs by tossing rocks onto a suspect north-facing slope. Those slopes had seen just enough wind to add some cohesion to the new snow, and the slabs failed on the weak, faceted snow at the storm interface.
Weather: Clear skies. Calm winds until we reached an exposed ridgeline at 12,000′, where there was just enough wind to cause light drifting.
Snowpack: About 4″ of new, low-density snow. Our obs focused on documenting the freshly buried near-surface weak layers that have been forming this month. At near and above treeline elevations, the January weak layer is characterized by small grained facets, often capped by either wind or sun crusts. The facets are generally fist hard, .5 mm in size, with a few up to .7 mm. Capping crusts are spatially variable depending on wind and sun exposure. Wind crusts vary in thickness and tend to be hard (1F or harder) throughout much of the alpine terrain. Sun crusts are generally soft (4F) and collapsible, up to 2cm thick, on E to SE aspects. They presumably get a bit thicker on due south and southwest, where we had limited travels.

Photos:

5269

Date of Observation: 01/22/2022

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: Skier’s far left in Climax shoots

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Visible skier-triggered slide activity that looked like D1. I observed it from the Nordic trails.

Photos:

5268

Date of Observation: 01/21/2022
Name: Zach Guy

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Mount Emmons, E & NE aspects to 10,800’

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: A few small skier triggered sluffs in the top 6” of snow
Weather: Overcast, calm winds, very light snowfall
Snowpack: 1cm of new snow covered the weak layers forming on the snow surface. On NE aspects, we found freshly buried surface up to about 9,700 ft. Small near surface facets (.5 to .7 mm) extend to ridgeline. On due east, there’s a thin soft crust capping the facets, and no surface hoar.

Photos:

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