Observations

Date of Observation: 02/02/2023
Name: Zach Guy

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Various aspects of Cement Creek, out to Tilton Pass to 12,000′

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Nothing today. A handful of D1 to D2 slab avalanches that likely ran during the most recent storm, all breaking in the upper snowpack and on near and above treeline slopes where there was wind drifting.
Weather: Beautiful day. Clear skies, light wind, inverted temps this morning.
Snowpack: Rode on more than a dozen small steep test slopes, mostly below treeline and a few drifted features near treeline without any signs of instability under the sled. Several stability tests suggest the most recent storm snow is unreactive in wind protected terrain. On a drifted south-facing slope, I got unstable results on a crust/facet layer about 45-50 cm deep under a 4F slab. One test in a shallow area (HS 85cm) produced a non-propagating failure on large-grained facets near the ground. Snow depths ranged from 80 cm at the trailhead to over 200 cm in the upper basin.

Photos:

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Date of Observation: 02/01/2023
Name: Curtis B

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Southeast flanks of Snodgrass – we traveled along the low angle corridor of the cutoff trail

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Came across a set of solo ski tracks coming from the direction of the standard skin track: from the looks of it, the skier started descending one of the steep, south facing pitches above the Snodgrass trail and made a quick course correction after a large pocket released just to the skier’s left.
Weather: Sunny, high temp in low 20s
Snowpack: ~20cm of (now compacting) snow from the recent storm cycle, on top of the 1/27 interface. New snow was getting dense & warm on S. Facing terrain

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5958

Date of Observation: 02/02/2023
Name: Eric Murrow

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: Poverty Gulch to sunny side of Cascade and lap through Camo Glades.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Observed a couple more natural avalanches from the last cycle on south and southeast slopes below treeline (a 1cm melt/freeze crust was present below the storm snow on a slope below the south-facing avalanche). A couple very small natural loose avalanches ran from steep rocky areas on south side of the compass.
Weather: Clear skies, cold temps at valley bottom but mild temps above the inversion zone. Light northwest winds with occasional gusting. I observed a small bit of drifting off the highest terrain.
Snowpack: Snow surfaces warmed and became moist in the top 1.5 inches. Shaded slopes below treeline held around a 20 of recent snow; the slab remains very soft outside of wind-affected areas and did not produce any cracking on a steep sheltered slope. On a drifted near treeline features, I was able to get a small hunk of snow to break at the storm interface after significant stomping. It felt like there could be some drifted features capable of producing a large slab avalanche and a lesser chance for much smaller slabs in sheltered areas.

Photos:

5957

Date of Observation: 02/01/2023

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: North Northwest at 10,500’

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Skier triggered slide in shallow old growth forest with moderately spaced trees. Slope angle was 40* on a North Northwest slope at 10,500’. Crown was 3’-4’ and the snowpack had about 18 inches of depth hoar with another 18 to 24 inches of powder on top of it. Bed surface was at the ground.
Weather: Clear and cold.
Snowpack:

Photos:

5956

Date of Observation: 02/01/2023

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Standard red lady bowl, skied skiers left of main bowl then cut far left down through the lower bowl.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Skier triggered on a steep rollover which was fairly loaded up. My track was the 5th or 6th track on the feature before it went. The crown looked to be around 2ft.
Weather:
Snowpack:

Photos:

5955

Date of Observation: 01/31/2023
Name: Eric Murrow

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: Washington Gulch Road to southern end of Mount Baldy.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Several natural avalanches were observed on drifted terrain in the Ruby Range. Slabs did not break deeply and appeared to just involve the snowfall since 1/27. See images.
Weather: Clear skies and light winds at upper elevations. No snow transport was observed during the day.
Snowpack: Below treeline, there was around a 15-inch soft slab from the recent snowy weather since 1/27. Near treeline on drifted terrain, slabs were closer to 2 feet + with hardness commonly 4 finger with isolated, well-drifted features up to 1 finger. Test profiles produced moderate and hard propagating results at the storm interface since 1/27. Both locations were previously drifted and failed above the drifting from last week (1/23 – 1/25). Light faceting was common above and below the older wind drifts from a week ago. I did not find a melt/freeze crust on due south slopes above 10,800 feet at the storm interface. Snow surfaces on southerly slopes became moist in the afternoon from solar radiation.

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5954

Date of Observation: 01/31/2023
Name: Zach Guy

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Viewed from Mt. CB

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: See photos and details below. D1 to D2 storm slab avalanches on various peaks near town that ran during yesterday’s storm.

Photos:

5953

Date of Observation: 01/31/2023
Name: Zach Guy

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: Rec tour on Schuylkill Ridge, northeasterly aspects to 11,400′

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: 3 large slab avalanches (D2) in the Great Wide Open that ran late yesterday or last night, about 2-3 feet thick from just below the windloaded ridgeline. 2 other large slab avalanches ran before the last round of snow, I’m guessing during Sunday night’s wind event. Both of those crossed the bench. The slide on Yogi’s covered the existing skin track with ~6 ft of debris.  Plus a number of other slab avalanches D1 to D1.5 at all elevations that ran during the storm, and evidence of other activity in the alpine that is drifted over again. See photos.
Weather: Clear, cold, calm winds.
Snowpack: In wind-sheltered terrain, undercutting steep slopes and skinning abov produced cracks up to 5′ long, about 16″ deep on the storm interface. Otherwise, no signs of instability; ski cut a few steeper rollovers without results.

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5952

Date of Observation: 01/31/2023
Name: billy barr

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Gothic townsite

Observed avalanche activity: No
Weather: Obscured clouds cover with light snow all day Monday accompanied by strong afternoon wind and blizzard conditions which finally let up at sunset. New snow total of 6½” with 0.45″ of water and the snowpack sits at 62½” under a (this is not a misprint) clear sky. Cooling after it cleared with the low the current -1F, with a light SW breeze.

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Date of Observation: 01/30/2023

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: A few laps on the North-Easterly lines of Snodgrass, accessed via Gothic Road skin track

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: All localized sluffs and small crowns, confined to storm snow-old snow interfaces only on the steepest of rollovers
Weather: Snowing hard all day, temps were pretty cold outside of denser stands of trees; the sun came through the clouds for about an hour midday; often still/subtly breezy, but there were frequent gusts around 25 mph throughout the day.
Snowpack: Pit @ ~9900 ft, NE aspect, 28* slope angle

Snow height at pit 155 cm

ECTN 7 @ 135 cm, storm snow-old snow interface, and with progressive loading to 30, ECT X. Moderately aggressive prying resulted in a non-planar break at 95 cm on what appeared to be an old sun crust that had just started to decompose before it was buried.

The top meter of snow ramped up in hardness from F for the top 20 cm to 4F for roughly another 30 cm to 1F for the remaining 50 cm, with no obvious weak layers detected.

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