Vail & Summit County
AvalancheAustin DiVesta Matt Allen · Jan 26, 2023 · Vail & Summit County
Weather
The day started off as cold, clear, and relatively calm winds. Around 11 am, winds started to pick up with moderate winds from the west. High-altitude clouds also started making their way over Elliot ridge by 1 pm, and by the time we were back at the trailhead, lower-altitude clouds began to dominate the sky.
Snowpack
We traveled on all aspects below and near treeline throughout the day and did not notice any cracking or collapsing. Ridgeline winds were moderate out of the west with moderate to intense wind-loading on easterly-facing slopes. Wind-drifted easterly slopes remained the most dangerous as we saw two small avalanches within the new snow below a prominent cornice, so we avoided those slopes. Southerly-facing slopes help the least amount of snow, with heights around 30-70cm, but you could still see bushes and small trees sticking up through the snow. Westerly-facing slopes also varied greatly in snow depths, with places near the treeline holding 25cm of snow to over a meter of snow. We dug in one of the deeper portions on a west-facing slope and found the upper 50cm of snow to be new snow mixed with some near-surface facets and the bottom 40cm, a mixture of basal facets and a couple of melt-freeze crusts. However, we did not get any propagation in an Extended Column Test, and on a Propagation Saw Test at 50cm, we had a result of 85/100End. On Northerly-facing terrain was a bit hard to find, but overall snow depths were the next deepest besides on due east wind-loaded slopes ranging from 120-170cm of snow.
Avalanche
We noticed several small R1-D1 avalanches directly below a very large cornice.