Front Range
AvalancheIan Fowler · Dec 2, 2024 · Front Range
Weather
Bluebird sunny day no wind.
Snowpack
I first traveled on westerly and northwesterly aspects below and near treeline. On these aspects I was consistently able to push my pole basket side down easily to the ground. When I dug a profile I confirmed there was very little slab, which is probably only weakening. An Extended Column Test just crushed all the the snow under the shovel but without any propagation. When I toured up onto the shoulder of Mines Peak above the northerly facing slide paths the snow was very firm and a mixture of sastrugi and wind buff with almost no ski penetration. In a crown profile of the avalanche I found two very firm wind slab layers. The first had defragmenting snow from last weeks storm that was faceting/mixed with facets from before the storm. Then below this was another pencil hard layer with facets to the ground. In some places the crown failed below the upper slab layer and in others it stepped to the ground. The crown varied from about a meter to about 30cm. There were some snowshoe tracks close to the crown so there is a chance the avalanche was remotely triggered.
Avalanche
I saw two small slides to the west of the Nitro Chutes. The larger avalanche mentioned was coded in this observation. https://avalanche.state.co.us/report/60cea9fe-7482-4755-a7f2-8218784e04e9