Avalanche: Upper Mineral

Observer Name
McKee
Observation Date
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Avalanche Date
Monday, February 22, 2010
Region
Salt Lake » Mineral Fork » Upper Mineral
Location Name or Route
Upper Mineral Fk.
Elevation
9,000'
Aspect
North
Slope Angle
36°
Trigger
Skier
Trigger: additional info
Unintentionally Triggered
Avalanche Type
Soft Slab
Weak Layer
Surface Hoar
Depth
20"
Width
60'
Vertical
60'
Caught
1
Carried
1
Comments

A member of our party decided to skip the last skin to milk the good skiing in upper mineral. He skied down the lower bench and skied into this gully triggering a slide. He took a short ride and temporarly lost most of his ski gear. Luckly most of our group had already descended from the other route and witnessed the slide and went to assist with the ski recovery. I had forgotten how complex the terrain was in that direction and figured he could ski to the lower bowl with no incident. He said that he didn't feel good about entering the gully but didn't see other options of descent. In hindsight we should've stuck togeather.

Lot of crowns and debri coming out of the west side of the upper basin; visibality was spotty, looked to be naturals.

Comments

Saw this debris pile on the trail on our way out, it crossed the trail and went into the creek. I think it's the same slide Dale Wang reported.

Coordinates