Avalanche: Pink Pine 3/27/2011

Observer Name:

Luke the drifter

Observation Date:

03/27/2011

Occurrence Date:

03/27/2011

Occurrence Time:

Morning

Region:

Salt Lake
Little Cottonwood Canyon
White Pine
Pink Pine

Location Name:

Pink pine east and west facing

Avalanche Characteristics

Elevation:

9000'

Aspect:

Northeast

Northwest

and steeper

Slope Angle:

Trigger:

Skier

Trigger: additional info:

Intentionally Triggered

Unintentionally Triggered

Avalanche Type:

Soft Slab

Weak Layer:

New Snow/Old Snow Interface

Depth (avg):

Width:

100'

Vertical:

Unknown

Snow Profile

Snow Profile Comments:

6" new snow over yesterday's greenhouses surface, q1 shears on test conducted on hang fire, also very difficult to isolate columns in hang fire (imagine that!) Snow stayed sensitive until I left during the early afternoon. I would not be surprised if this instability lingered a bit, seems a lot more sensitive than anything in the last week

General Comments

6 slides on east facing upper pink pine, some remote, some triggered by kicking/jumping on top of slope 2 on west facing pink pine, in the tree chutes were Dave Anderson got caught in the 90's. All ran to the point were the slope angle decrease to less than 25 degrees Not enough to bury you on smaller slopes but certainly enough to knock you over and carry you or slam you into a tree, piles in front of trees were 2' deep All ran fast once that got moving. One on the west facing was "somewhat" intentional, I skied the shot while cutting the steeper rolls sort of expecting one of them to pop...it did, mid slope