Northern San Juan
AvalancheJeff Dobronyi · Jan 14, 2017 · Northern San Juan
Weather
Moderate snow overnight and through the morning, abating around 1000. Light to calm winds through the day. Skies cleared from obscured in AM to broken at 1500.
Snowpack
Deep snowpack around Chattanooga compared with rest of the zone. HS 160-190. Most avalanches seemed to run in storm snow or recently buried interfaces.
Avalanche
Many natural D1 to D1.5 avalanches on S and W facing slopes below treeline around Chattanooga by 1000 this morning, too many to count. Most were loose dry but there were many small soft slab avalanches as well. At 1015, We observed a natural avalanche on the E facing cliffs above Mill Creek/ Silver Cloud mine. Size D2, type unknown. At 1700 this evening, I skinned south on the highway and saw no avalanches in Sams. I also toured north and saw no avalanches in Chattanooga chutes, but I didn't get too close for fear of tempting the Eagle.