Vail & Summit County
AvalancheAndrew McWilliams · Feb 23, 2024 · Vail & Summit County
Weather
Broken skies cleared with light westerly winds and temperatures rising into the high teens and low twenties.
Snowpack
I observed two weak layers in the upper snowpack - one buried around 2/2 and the other buried around 2/12. In pits on an east and southeast aspect just above 1 1,000 feet, these weak layers were composed of facets adjacent to melt-freeze crusts. The snow above these weak layers was fist to four-finger hard on the Hand Hardness Scale. On the east aspect, the slab above the weak layers was thicker and I only got a result on the 2/2 layer in an Extended Column Test (ECT) after six blows from the shoulder. On the southeast aspect, I got a non-propagating result after five taps from the wrist on the 2/12 layer and a propagating result after one tap from the elbow on the 2/2 layer in an ECT. The crusts were thicker and harder on the southeast aspect than the east. Below the 2/2 layer in the southeast snowpit, vertical ice bodies were running through the snowpack. These were not present in the basal facet layer. This pit was in a thinner area of the slope and the test results likely would not be as reactive where the slab is thicker. That being said, these are the present weak layers of concern and while you might find "hard" results in a snowpit and limited feedback from the snowpack (I observed no cracking or collapsing), you can trigger an avalanche large enough to bury you on either layer.
Avalanche
I saw an avalanche in "Birthday Chute" across the Pitkin Creek drainage from the ridge of Outpost Peak. Coded here: https://avalanche.state.co.us/observations/field-report/af786d19-447e-4888-83e0-a8a6095c3872