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Salt Lake » Big Cottonwood Canyon » Solitude

Crystal Point, Solitude

8,500'

Northeast

35°

Skier

Unintentionally Triggered

Wet Slab

Wet Snow

New Snow/Old Snow Interface

10"

20'

400'

After a day of skiing Honeycomb Canyon at elevation above 9000' and heading down canyon and back to the parking lot I skied Crystal Point at about 4pm. The snow had been somewhat damp all day from the warming sun but skied quite nicely especially above 9000'. No tendency to slide was noticed on the mostly Northeast facing slopes during the day. The snow at crystal point was a bit damper at its lower elevation. As I skied about half way down the slope near some scrub and rock a slow moving slide was initiated on a turn and was captured on camera. The slide was a wet slab set off by a point release from one of my turns as shown in pictures.

I was skiing with 2 x GoPro cameras rolling; one forward and the other pointing back. A turn near some scrub on the edge of a small drop initiates a point release that triggers a larger wet slab next to a rock band which I had just skied through. If you look closely on at the rearward footage you can see the wet slide moving like a wave near the rock band. I had moved skiers left away from the rock band and when I stop and turn towards that path the forward camera catches the slide moving past and down to the basin below.