Northern San Juan

Avalanche

Sheamus Croke · Mar 7, 2022 · Northern San Juan

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Weather

Bouts of heavy snowfall with periodic opening of good visibility. 3-5 inches of warm and high-density snow from the day/night before with areas of significant loading due to SW winds (base of ~20mph with gusts above 40mph)

Snowpack

Fast and quite unreactive new snow, even in areas of loading. No major cracking/slab releases seen up high. However a lurking and difficult to predict persistent slab problem from the ~24 inch storm snow that fell around 2 weeks ago (?) on top of a dust layer. Did hear a collapse whumph above wedding chutes on the side step traverse to that terrain

Avalanche

R1.5 D1?, N facing BTL 10,880 small pocket released from skier trigger. Skier was able to ski in front of slide and pull out of path. Seemed to be more than just the new storm snow (as it was a relatively protected area and had a much more slab-like behavior, but hard to say for certain as we didn't inspect the crown).