Observations of Natural Avalanche Cycle

Riding quality was:

OK

Snow conditions were:

• Crusty
• Powder
• Wet
• Wind affected

We rode:

• Alpine slopes
• Mellow slopes
• Sunny slopes

We stayed away from:

• Convex slopes
• Steep slopes

The day was:

• Cloudy
• Sunny
• Windy

Avalanche conditions

• Rapid temperature rise to near or above 0°C or wet surface snow.

Excellent turns on spearhead glacier with 15cm of dry snow on top of a supportive crust. Continued laps down the glacier towards the lake on N aspects with good skiing but increasing wind affect. From spearhead shoulder we could see the Trorey E face and N face slides. Could not get good pics from our distance.

We continued to Phalanx N bowl. The entire lower pitch slid in the last cycle with >1m crowns connecting across the bowl. There were large cornice chunks scattered throughout the eastern portion of the start zone. Notably, strong E winds reloaded the start zone with fresh windslab in places. The deep crowns continued pretty much on every N avalanche slope above the exit bench (1800-2000m), and we observed some massive debris flows on our way out.

N aspects above 1800m had a ~5cm supportive crust below recent storm snow. The snow beneath this crust remained quite moist from the warm up. W aspects on our exit were spring slush (no crust).