Northern San Juan
AvalancheLorne Glick · May 7, 2019 · Northern San Juan
Weather
Sunny with a few clouds. Warm. Light wind from the south. Kendall showed a low of 28 at 7:00am and 32 at 11:00.
Snowpack
Corn on corn. About 6" settled/melted white snow from last week's storms on top of the dust layer and winter's snowpack. NE facing with variations on the face to NNE and E. The Summit is 13,156 feet, bottom of the face is around 12,000 feet.
Avalanche
The summit couloir skied well. No signs of instability were noted. Timing seemed good at around 10:45. My partner had traversed a little way right from the first shot and stopped. I made a couple more turns below, then traversed right. At a slight aspect variation towards the east, it fractured about 40x40 feet with the crown 5 feet below my skis. The bed surface was the dust layer. The avalanche took all 6" of the white snow and went over the 150' cliff below. On high alert now, I skied the bed surface, which was also good corn, then cut right to our initial rib. My partner worked his way down to and past me, triggering another similar-sized avalanche below. It broke just above his board. He tried sinking his axe shaft, but the snow was too heavy. He was carried into a rocky section and over two small cliffs, tearing an edge off his board and losing his axe, but riding through somehow unscathed.