Race(horse) against the machine

Riding quality was:

Good

Snow conditions were:

• Powder

We rode:

• Mellow slopes

Avalanche conditions

• Whumpfing or drum-like sounds or shooting cracks.

Today we made our way to Racehorse. Throughout our travels we saw no new avalanches.

At 1:00 pm we were at 2100 m. It was -2, snowing lightly, and the wind was moderate with strong gusts from the W/NW. We dug 2 profiles, one on a south aspect and one on a north aspect. Much like yesterday (see our min from Crown Mountain) we were getting settlement and whumpfing as soon as we stepped off trail. Whumpfing typically signals a collapse of a weak layer in the snow - so we knew without even seeing it, that the persistent weak layer was present.

When we dug into the snow we found a mix of surface hoar and facets on a crust buried under 50-60 cm of snow. In all of our tests we got easy-moderate propagating results on this layer.

Despite the wind, we had a great day. We are anticipating a bit of new snow, and potentially some warming in the coming days, further adding stress to the buried weak layer. We opted to stay out of avalanche terrain, knowing what is lurking beneath us!