Aspen
AvalancheGreg Shaffran · Mar 17, 2015 · Aspen
Weather
Very warm yesterday (est. high 40's F), windy last night at the hut, and today was hot, but cooler than yesterday, with a light breeze today.
Avalanche
We saw quite a number of avalanches along Express Creek on NE-E aspects between 10000-12000 with most being between 10500' and 11200'. Most of these were old, and observed last Wednesday (3/11), but a few had slide since then. We saw a couple large Loose Wet avalanches on SE aspects below the M&M Chutes in Little Italian Basin that reached down to the ground and entrained a significant amount of snow. Skiing out Little Italian this morning you could tell how these same Loose Wet avalanches on SE aspects observed yesterday had expanded and become wider and ran farther downhill. Also, while driving down Castle Creek this afternoon I saw a large avalanche in the Five Fingers Drainage off Highlands Ridge that broke near the center of the drainage lower down at approx 11500'. There looked to be a couple other smaller slides that broke closer to the ridge in other parts of Five Fingers as well.