Lower Gin Peak

Out leading a splitboarding trip with the UBC VOC. Around mid-morning, we moved from the 'below treeline' to 'treeline' elevation band, and the snow became much drier and wind-affected. We decided to hike up the slopes south of the lake, and noticed some wind-effects as we ascended. Atop our line, I dug a test pit to ID potential weaknesses, and we found sudden shears after easy loading on a layer buried 15cms deep and was propagating fully across the column. Further weaknesses were observed, but were all resistant and buried deeper, and were not propagating across the column. With this info, we decided to ski atop ridge crests and ride mellow, straight slopes to mitigate the hazard. There was really dry, awesome pow shots above treeline riding down to the lake. Winter's not over everyone!

Dug a test pit on a 39 degree, W facing slope at the upper elevations of the treeline elevation gradient before skiing back down to Hanging Lake. Performed an initial compression test to ID potential weaknesses; results are as follows: CTE2 (SP) down 15cm on 2mm SH; CTM12 (RP) down 62 cms; CTM13 (RP) down 35cm. Because we found some sudden fractures and some fractures at fairly significant depth, we performed an extended column test to test for fracture propagation propensity. The results are as follows: ECTP3 (SP) down 15cm on 2mm SH; ECTN12 (RP) down 40cm; ECTN17 (RP) down 62cms.