Observation: Public

Observation Details

Signs of Unstable Snow

Observations

After skiing in the resort where we had seen some sluffing of the new snow that didn’t go too far, which seemed consistent with the avalanche report. We traveled out the west boundary of the resort, and decided to ski an open bowl. We decided to ski the shallower skier’s left NE side of the bowl. The first skier skied close to the trees on the far left side I was the second skier and skied slightly right of the other tracks, closer to the center of the bowl. After I stopped the first skier heard a crack and the convex slope on the more westerly side of the bowl started to slide. We moved as fast as we could toward the trees on the east side. The slide looked like it started on the rain layer that we had observed and then stepped down to another layer. The crown looked to be about 18 inches at its deepest point and it ran about 150 feet wide, and maybe 200 feet down to the bottom of the bowl. Three NPS rangers had been digging pits at the top. When we skinned out we talked to them to confirm observations and that no one had been buried or injured.