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Avalanche: No Name Bowl

Observer Name
mark white
Observation Date
Friday, January 1, 2021
Avalanche Date
Friday, January 1, 2021
Region
Salt Lake » Park City Ridgeline » No Name Bowl
Location Name or Route
No Name Bowl
Elevation
9,500'
Aspect
East
Slope Angle
34°
Trigger
Skier
Trigger: additional info
Unintentionally Triggered
Avalanche Type
Soft Slab
Avalanche Problem
Persistent Weak Layer
Weak Layer
Facets
Depth
12"
Width
150'
Vertical
500'
Comments
I triggered this avalanche in No Name Bowl today. I've visited this slope many times this year but the last three times I've visited it I've walked away, today when we went I climb down into the bowl and probed the snow, it consisted of a couple feet of totally faceted snow with a thin slab just off the ridgeline, stepping down farther revealed basically just a pile of facets with no real slab or denser layer on top. We skied a run with no cracking or collapsing or any other sort of red flags. Once at the top again we decided to do another run to the skiers left which is more E facing, gets a lot of sun and is less steep than the right side. We had been avoiding the right side all year knowing that it had more snow, was steeper, more northerly facing and gets more wind loading. My two partners went first with no activity, then I went, I was about 60% of the way down the slope just about to where the angle flattens out and I triggered the slide 300ft above me. I heard a yell then saw the slope dinner plating in front of me. I already knew which way was my best escape route and pointed it to the skiers left side of the bowl. I didn't really see the slide but my partners said it was moving fairly slow, and it never got to close to catching me. That being said in my opinion if you trigger a slide while skiing you have made a mistake, and a miscalculation. The difference between the first and second run was minuscule, a little more E facing, and more sun. But that little difference made for a hard bed surface at the ground interface, due to early season melt-freeze cycles. This hard bed layer was not in play on our first run. Looking at the snow on the way up revealed this hard bed surface with large grained facets resting on top. The take away here is SPATIAL VERITABILITY, just a small change in aspect, or snow structure can be the difference between triggering a slide or not. Things are complicated and will probably get more complicated with each new load. Not much of a beleaver in the expert halo, spent time checking the snow pack with probing and digging a pit in the starting zone, discussed what we found and made a call on our shared judgements, wrong call this time, but we thought it out and just didn't dive in. But like I said triggering an avalanche while skiing means you made a mistake or missed some pertinent information at some point and time and I'll happily admit it.
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