UDOT PLANNED AVALANCHE CLOSURES!!

Avalanche: Chablis

Observer Name
Nalli
Observation Date
Sunday, February 19, 2012
Avalanche Date
Sunday, February 19, 2012
Region
Provo » Provo Canyon » Chablis
Location Name or Route
Slide Canyon
Elevation
10,400'
Aspect
East
Slope Angle
39°
Trigger
Natural
Avalanche Type
Dry Loose
Weak Layer
New Snow
Depth
6"
Width
200'
Vertical
1,000'
Comments

Plenty of LS-N-1's in the Provo area today during the height of precip around 08:00. Naturals needed a slope of around 39 deg and everything down to about 35deg was easy to trigger on skis. Pics of Slide Canyon LS-N-1+ at 10,000' and also Snowslide Jr just above the bike path on the Provo River. Creative names huh?

This is the first avalanche out of Snowslide Jr. this year. It had no snow in it until the storm on Feb. 12.

Comments

The first half of the day a combination of not enough new snow and very low wind speeds made it hard to find a slab anywhere. By mid day however the wind picked up just enough to change this. I intentionally triggered this 6" deep slab at 8800', NE, 38deg, 50'wide in Chablis Bowl with a ski cut. The thing is that it seemed to propagate further than I expected for just a density change. After further investigation, sure enough, surface hoar from the last three days. I continued to find it elsewhere throughout the drainage and had some more cracking and small SS fail as a result. I suspect that the SH may not stay sensitive for too long due to the low density snow both above and below it.

Comments

The wind only lasted for a few hours and I dont think it did too much damage.

Coordinates