The wind has won
AvalancheMegan Kelly · Dec 16, 2016 · Flathead
Quick report
- Weather
- cold, windy
- Stayed Away
- alpineSlopes
- Riding Quality
- ok
- Snow Conditions
- powder, windAffected
Last week's unconsolidated snow has been transformed into windslabs at treeline and in the alpine changing the way we have been thinking about and using terrain. Today we avoided any wind effected slopes. We came across an avalanche from yesterday and were surprised to see how far it spread across the slope; (see avalanche summary tab for details). December's cold weather has created sugary crystals in the snowpack that are weak. With the new wind slab above, this combination could create avalanches big enough to do damage.
Avalanche
- Run Length
- 100
- Slab Width
- 200
- Trigger Type
- natural
- Wind Exposure
- crossLoadedSlope
- Avalanche Size
- 2
- Start Zone Aspect
- NE
- Vegetation Cover
- openSlope
- Start Zone Incline
- 40
- Avalanche Character
- windSlab
- Number Of Avalanches
- 1
- Start Zone Elevation
- 2000
- Runout Zone Elevation
- 1900
- Avalanche Observation
- 12to24hrsAgo
- Weak Layer Crystal Type
- facets
- Start Zone Elevation Band
- alp
- Avalanche Occurrence Datetime
- 2016-12-16T01:00:00
We suspect it was triggered from SW winds sometime on Dec.15