Observations

Date of Observation: 03/13/2023
Name: Zach Guy

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Various locations as viewed from town and Brush Creek.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Documenting a few more storm slabs that likely ran early Saturday, and a small glide release that ran today.

Photos:

6107

Date of Observation: 03/13/2023
Name: Irwin Guides

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: Irwin Tenure

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: A few point releases on Robinson E wall, and SW aspects in the New World. All below rock bands. The Southeast Face of Afley ran wall to wall during the storm.
Snowpack: No signs of instability today, yesterdays storm slabs have settled and become unreactive. Snow surfaces did get moist on all aspects and elevations in our tenure. Roller balls were starting on E-S aspects after 1230. No signs of instability after AE tests on S aspects or any other of our terrain traveled

Photos:

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6106

Date of Observation: 03/13/2023
Name: Zach Guy

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: West Brush Creek. Traveled mostly on east and northeast aspects to 11,600′

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Observed a large storm slab (D2.5) run this afternoon off the south face of Teo. The slab initiated as a relatively small pocket on a southeast aspect and then triggered a much broader, thicker crown on a cross-loaded terrain feature facing south that subsequently ran to valley floor.
Several very small dry loose and wet loose avalanches ran throughout the day.
West Brush Creek drainage saw a fairly widespread storm slab cycle, D1-D2, likely Friday night-Saturday morning. Pics show the largest slides, though there were plenty more. In three of the S/SW gullies of Teo, storm slabs stepped down and triggered more destructive persistent slabs, D2.5-D3. The crowns were mostly filled in but I measured debris blocks as thick as 4 feet, pencil hard.
Weather: Few to scattered skies through mid-afternoon. Mild temps. Calm winds.
Snowpack: I didn’t measure storm snow totals, but they seemed on par with other areas, in the 2-foot range. Snow surfaces became moist to wet on everything without a northerly tilt, producing a few rollerballs and minor sluffs. We skied on several steep, shady slopes with no signs of instability. However, we did get a creek bed to calve off about 3-feet deep on a facet layer at valley bottom.

Photos:

6105

Date of Observation: 03/13/2023

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: Axtell 1st bowl

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Remote triggered D1.5 storm slab from 5m away on east-facing flank of 1st bowl near old prayer flags. Collapse was loud. Crown estimated to be 70cm x 20m. Appeared to fail at storm interface.
Several old crowns in 1st and 2nd bowl that looked to have released mid-storm.
Ski cut triggered D1 in a north-facing chute of 1st bowl. The second rider was able to trigger additional hang fire with a second ski cut. Crown was estimated to be 40cm x 10m. This path appeared to have failed mid-storm then again with our ski cuts presumably at the storm interface.

Photos:

6104

Date of Observation: 03/13/2023
Name: Travis Guy

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Gothic road between gothic town site and SAIL site

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Heard/saw about 8 avalanches running down the chutes on gothic east face. First avalanche seen was at 11:07 (circled in red). Subsequent avalanches seen/heard for the next 2 hours (circled in green)
Weather: Sunny, calm, -3.2C (at 11:10am)

Photos:

6103

Date of Observation: 03/13/2023
Name: Rob Strickland

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Standard skinner. A few inches of new provide a bit of float above the crusts

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: – East side of the bowl (west facing) wet slab.
– Inde basin (photo). All east facing ripped and looked like a shallow slab but impressive R3/4.
– But no movement on east facing Elk Creek shots.
Some examples of cornice fall to D1 and filled in again.
Weather: Partly light… partly cloudy.
Snowpack: Deeep. Where’d all those little trees go?

Photos:

6102

Date of Observation: 03/13/2023
Name: billy barr

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Gothic Townsite

Observed avalanche activity: No
Weather: Light snow Sunday, then a short wave after dark before scattered showers overnight with 6″ new and water a more reasonable 0.44″. Currently cloudy with a few small patches of what passes for blue (take what you can get) and calm (have to love that one). Current snowpack is winter deepest at 83½”
Snowpack:

6101

Date of Observation: 03/12/2023
Name: Irwin Guides

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: Irwin Tenure

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Several non-destructive D1 storm slabs on W NTL. 50-100′ wide propagation.
Weather: OVC, 27/17 deg, W 10-20 g 30, convective snow showers off and on S1.
Snowpack: Snow became low-density by the end of the storm. Afternoon 2d SWE 6%. W aspects NTL touchy-very touchy nondestructive storm slabs 6-10″ this morning. DL on W & E aspects on terrain >37 deg, mostly surface graupel from today’s snow.

6100

Date of Observation: 03/12/2023
Name: Cosmo Langsfeld

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Grassy Hill

Observed avalanche activity: No
Weather: Overcast. Started snowing in earnest around 1pm.
Snowpack: A few quiet whoomfs on west/southwestish meadows around 10500-11k. Didnt see any shooting cracks or feel anything collapse. Just whoomfs.

6099

Date of Observation: 03/12/2023
Name: Evan Ross

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Mt Emmons. 9,000 to 10,200. W-NE-E. BTL

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: 3 to 4 D2’s in the Climax Chutes and a few smaller avalanches. These all likely ran early Saturday morning. Couldn’t see any crowns in the start zones, so assuming they were storm slabs that entrained snow.

A couple of small point releases today on various aspects.

Weather: Mostly cloudy. Calm wind. Up to 2″ of new snow in the afternoon.

Snowpack: We didn’t find any signs of instability on this lower-elevation tour. Lots of settlement from yesterday, and yesterday’s crust that formed around most of the compass, appeared to have killed the storm slab problem in this location. A couple of small point-release avalanches that ran today in the climax chutes, and on a NE-facing slope at 10,400ft didn’t propagate in the storm snow. We did 1 ECT test at 9,600ft, NE aspect, 35-degree slope, and got ECTN results in the storm snow and at the old snow interface.

HST on yesterday’s crust was 4″ down low and 6″ at 10,200ft.

We ran into the Gunsight Moose on the descent. The Moose was hanging out on GB loop.

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