Sawatch
AvalancheArden Feldman · Feb 27, 2018 · Sawatch
Weather
Warmer with few clouds and light to moderate winds at ridge top.
Snowpack
Recent winds have created varying snowpack surfaces including sastrugi, thin wind crusts, and wind loaded pockets.
Avalanche
Checked out a previously reported persistent slab avalanche above Hwy 91 on a NTL, generally east facing slope. It was bigger than I had initially thought. The crown reached a maximum depth of around 15 feet (!) where it pulled back into the cornice. There were multiple car sized chunks in the debris and one chunk that was definitely larger than my pickup. It was around 500 feet wide and ran 800 feet vertical feet down the path. It failed on a thin layer of 1F hard small grained facets sandwiched between two pencil hard layers but stepped down down to the ground/DH in a number of spots. Natural R3-D2.5