While skinning up Patterson Ridge we kept true to the standard skinner which stays pretty true to the ridge. Around 9400 the slope gets steeper and we decided to set a new skinner as the old one traversed pretty far out on the east facing slabs. Around 9600 we ended up slightly on the east face again and just before going for a kick turn got a collapse and the snow around me fractured. I started to move with the snow but fortunately it was only about 15-20 feet wide and I was close enough to the fringe to somehow jump around and leap onto non moving snow. We watched as the slab slid out of sight and ran about 400 ft through the trees. Being carried was a matter of being out a couple more feet before it broke or slower reflexes. A good sign to remember that avalanches are back on the table as we get more snow on top of very weak and faceted snow on the northern half of the compass. With the crown being 12-14 inches and only about 4 inches being new snow we determined the slide probably ran on the same layer as the Jan 7th Slide that ripped out most of the slabs.

Saw another natural slide on the same aspect near near the top of Gods lawnmower which leads us to believe this was not an isolated incident.