UDOT PLANNED AVALANCHE CLOSURES!!

Avalanche: Wellsvilles

Observer Name
Eric and Amy Flygare and Jason Wooden
Observation Date
Wednesday, April 7, 2010
Avalanche Date
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
Region
Logan » Wellsvilles
Location Name or Route
Elevation
9,000'
Aspect
Northeast
Slope Angle
35°
Trigger
Natural
Trigger: additional info
Repeater
Avalanche Type
Soft Slab
Depth
Unknown
Width
Unknown
Vertical
Unknown
Comments

Eric Flygare

I was scoping the Wellsvilles this morning. there are significant slabs that have run down nearly every major drainage. Some of the slabs are several hundred feet wide and run 1000+ vert. They do not appear to be extremely deep probably 1-2 feet. (Eric)

Pine canyon: 300-400 foot crown on a Northeast facing slope. It appeared to involve the new snow only. The slide started near the ridge (wind affected area) and ran approximately 500 feet ,

South Shumway Canyon: 200 foot crown at mid slope (approximately 8000 feet) on a North facing slope. This was an interesting slides because it did not appear to have propagated from a wind affected area. The slide ran several hundred feet down the canyon.

Shumway Canyon: 200-300 foot crown starting at the highest peak on the Northeast facing slope. The slide ran around 1000 feet. This area has slide at least three times this year that I have noticed.

Coldwater Canyon: Minor slabs released on Northeast facing slopes.

North fork Hells Canyon: Small slab running 1500-200 vertical.

Old Logway: This was the most significant slab that I could see. If you look in Jason Wooden’s picture you can see the crown running approximately 1500 feet down the south ridge. There were also several small slabs that sympathetically released further down the canyon in less wind affected areas.

Mendon Peak: Looked like a small slab released during the storm and was mostly covered later in the storm.

OVERALL: I observed many slab avalanches releasing on steep (>35 degrees) North to East facing slopes. Most avalanches appeared to involve only the new snow and most were in wind affected areas. There were several other smaller avalanches in non-wind affected areas the released sympathetically. Agree with the assessment of a High avalanche danger.

(4-9-10) Hey, I just snapped a shot of one of the slides on the Wellsvilles today. It's pretty crazy to look at the dot to dot (from tree to tree) where it fractured. Kinda cool. Anyway, thanks for all that you guys do to help keep us safe. Hope you have a great summer. (Amy)

Comments

Jason Wooden

Soft avalanche, east aspect, started at 8600' and ran to at least 6200' on a 35 degree slope. Depth difficult to determine- crown might be 4' deep, width at fracture 300', then a 50'-75'+ path width. Appeared to ride on newest layer deposited by the weekend storm continuing into Tuesday. Natural release. No damage to vegetation.

Wind had been mostly out of the south then west the past couple of days, heavily loading the Wellsville ridgeline. Cornices have grown substantially in this time. remote observation Certainly not epic by Wellsville standards but worth noting nonetheless. Also note in the picture a similar slide in N. Fork of Hell Canyon (to the south) and numerous point releases below the cornices which didn't run as far. Looking at the log, it appears the N. Fork of Old Logway slid on 4/3, before this most recent storm.

Coordinates