Vail & Summit County

Avalanche

Justin Ibarra · Nov 12, 2020 · Vail & Summit County

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Weather

Mostly sunny, no precip, Strong winds prevailing from the SW on ridgetop and moderate winds blowing S-SE in the basin, moderate blowing snow to intense on ridgetops.

Snowpack

Still low tide. From the TH and on the S-SE aspects the HS averaged around 15-30cm with mostly soft surface conditions and no presence of basal faceting. Heading up and onto more Easterly terrain the HS stayed mostly the same with some deeper localized drifting. Surface conditions started to reveal reactive windslabs developing in micro cross loaded terrain features but we still couldn't find any basal faceting. Toured up a little bit higher to about 11,600ft and found a small shaded NE piece of terrain under a rock outcropping. Windslabs got thicker and we also found a mid pack slab that failed above an ice crust near the ground, and then also failing below the crust on basal facets.

Avalanche

n/o