Avalanche: Sugarloaf

Observer Name
Duncan
Observation Date
Thursday, April 16, 2020
Avalanche Date
Thursday, April 16, 2020
Region
Salt Lake » Little Cottonwood Canyon » Alta Ski Area » Sugarloaf
Location Name or Route
Sugarloaf Peak/Devils Castle
Elevation
10,800'
Aspect
Northeast
Trigger
Skier
Depth
10"
Width
80'
Comments
Super sweet snow dropping the lookers left chute off of Sugarloaf Peak in to Devils Castle but as expected there was quite the wind slab that propagated the width of the chute and slid all the new snow. I dropped in cautiously with a ski cut to get it to go and it was stubborn and didn’t go so I went for the cut across with my safe zone in mind and sure enough in the middle of the chute it propagated above me and all around me, luckily it was short chute and I had a plan so I just pointed it turned right and let it go into the bowl below and ran about 500 feet. Definitely touchy out there, don’t ski anything without a plan on how to manage these large new snow slides, or just avoid them, in more consequential terrain that slide I caused could have been the end of me.