Observation: Public

Observation Details

Triggered Avalanches

Signs of Unstable Snow

Observations

Reached the top of Granite a little after 6pm. Snow at the top was much warmer and wetter than expected, for a relatively cool cloudy evening. Didn't see rollerballs on the way up, and snow we kicked down didn't grow / gain momentum (although the top several inches of snow was definitely soft).

First turn off the top sloughed a trivial (we thought -- a couple inches deep, maybe) amount of loose wet snow off the surface, but that pretty quickly grew and spread out as it slid downhill. Slide continued all the way down the big avy path on the south side of granite (~2500ft below), and was pretty big and moving pretty fast by the time it reached the runout. Definitely big enough to bury a person. We stuck to the lower-angle ridge on the west side of the mountain and skied through the trees after that, but snow on slopes over maybe 30/35 degrees definitely wanted to slide.

The trail does cross the slide path in that runout zone; there were only a few other people on the mountain, and we didn't see anyone down below when we started down, but spent over an hour searching the debris with our probes anyway. Based on cars in the parking lot, we don't think anyone was buried. Really hope that's true.