New Snow and Instability

New Snow and Instability

Date
Activity
Snowmobiling

We rode to the Taylor Fork Weather station, then to the Wilderness Boundary above Beaver Creek, and then through Sage and Carrot Basin. There was 13-14" of new snow throughout the area. At the Wilderness Boundary we saw several R2-D2 avalanches on a NE facing ridgeline above Beaver Creek. We dug a pit on a SW aspect at 8,800' that was 9' in depth (HS: 279 cm). We had an ECTP 11 at the interface between the new and old snow. We also had an ECTP 24 on a layer of 1.0 mm facets sandwiched between two melt freeze crusts. These results and the recent avalanche activity highlighted the instability that exists from this most recent snow. When we were leaving our pit site the visibility improved, and we saw  a R3-D3 avalanche in a high alpine bowl. This avalanche confirmed that deep slab avalanches are still a concern for our advisory area.

Region
Southern Madison
Location (from list)
Taylor Fork
Observer Name
Dave Zinn, Alex Haddad