Home > Trip Reports > March 15, 2009; Yodelin powfest

March 15, 2009; Yodelin powfest

3/15/09
WA Stevens Pass
3311
5
Posted by cascadesfreak on 3/15/09 12:44pm
Deep! 

Snowing hard all day (about a foot of fresh snow on the cars upon return to the parking lot) and great light powder shots had in the forest and low angle open slopes.  Melt/freeze crust ~12-to-15" deep in the trees, but rapidly getting buried deeper.

Lots of cautious route selection today.  If heading out tomorrow, watch for a very reactive shallow weak layer (likely buried surface hoar) which was being rapidly loaded today.  We remotely triggered several small shallow slabs (~4-to-6" deep, and becoming deeper as snowfall progressed) near short unanchored test slopes and convexities.  Noted 1 large shallow slab on a ~35-degree north-facing open slope near ~4,500-ft (may have been remotely triggered by our skin track on nearby low-angle terrain).  The suspected weak layer was buried surface hoar possibly formed during brief clearing overnight, as the shallow slabs noted involved only the snowfall received today, and only seemed to occur in areas exposed to open sky (i.e. no such slide activity was triggered or noted by our group in the closed canopy forest).

~3 hour drive back to the Seattle area in crawling/stopped traffic down from Stevens Pass.

Nice!  Sorry  I missed you boys today.  Got stuck skiing deep snow at the area and eating fries with the little one in the lodge....Next time..

Great report.  Thanks for the good info.




Nice face shot there Chris!  T'was deep at the local Pass too, almost too deep.

That first shot is money!!!

author=shred link=topic=12698.msg52973#msg52973 date=1237253047]
That first shot is money!!!


I'm fairly certain that photo pinpoints when and where I caught the cold I woke up with yesterday.  Well done, Weep.

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march-15-2009-yodelin-powfest
cascadesfreak
2009-03-15 19:44:44