Gunnison

Snowpack

Crested Butte Avalanche Center · Dec 31, 2017 · Gunnison

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Weather

Weather: Breezy with scattered clouds.

Snowpack

Snowpack: Toured up Poverty Gulch to an easterly face at about 11800'. As we were skinning up the last of the climb, a large crack set off, it was about 100 ft long and produced a loud "cosmic" sound. Unfortunately, I did not get a chance to see how deep it propagated. We did not experience any other cracking, collapses, or any other avalanche obs during our tour. After a investigatory pit we found that the total snow-pack is about 115cm. I did a small column test that produced a sudden collapse with moderate taps below the sun/dust crust as well as a shovel sheer test that failed with moderate pressure just above the sun/dust crust.