Get Your Ticket to the 32nd Annual Backcountry Benefit on September 11th! Support Forecasting, Awareness, and Education

Observer Name
Wessler, Kelly, Meisenheimer
Observation Date
Sunday, December 3, 2023
Avalanche Date
Sunday, December 3, 2023
Region
Salt Lake » Big Cottonwood Canyon » Twin Lakes Pass
Location Name or Route
Twin Lakes Pass
Elevation
10,200'
Aspect
Northeast
Slope Angle
35°
Trigger
Natural
Avalanche Type
Soft Slab
Avalanche Problem
Wind Drifted Snow
Weak Layer
New Snow/Old Snow Interface
Depth
3'
Width
150'
Vertical
500'
Comments
Observed natural avalanche cycle from overnight. Best guess is this was a wind-loaded snow avalanche that failed on new/old snow interface. If it did step down deeper to older facets it had been filled in by the time we observed these avalanches. A snowpit on a nearby north facing slope at 10,000' showed 5' of snow with 2 faceted layers. One at the new/old interface and one about 1' off the ground.
It was hard to gauge exact width, but we observed three different avalanches that could have been easily connected a few hundred feet wide and ran anywhere from 400 to 600 hundred vertical feet. What was interesting was that the crown faces were approximately 30-40' below the ridgetops, which leads us to believe it was a wind-loaded avalanche from strong winds.

We observed multiple instances of cracking and collapsing, including long reaching visible cracks just below the ridgeline.
Coordinates