Jan 4, 2010, Bullion Basin
1/4/10
WA Cascades West Slopes South (Mt Rainier)
1787
0
John and I got a late start (11:00...) up the trail into Bullion. I toured with Alecapone on Saturday at Stevens and was sufficiently sketched out with whoomping and Q1 fractures on isolation, so we were particularly concerned with avi conditions.
Practiced safe travel techniques on the way into the valley and performed compression, ECT and saw propagation tests along the way. Found CT15-17/Q2 fractures at approximately 12" and other tests showed reasonable stability. Especially compared to Saturday at Stevens. With that data we climbed to the saddle on the south part of the valley, completed some more tests on the other side and found our columns breaking at CT12/Q2.
Feeling Ok with our tests we dropped in on the backside on the S-SE face (looks like it is South of Cement, if anyone knows the "proper" name please reply). Snow was nice, I was hitting the crust (skis) but carving into it but John (snowboard) said he never felt it.
We climbed back up to the saddle and set a track up the ridgeline heading up towards Norse. Stopped at the first peak and had a great long run down as the sun was setting.
Saw some crowns that on the climb out from the backside of Bullion that looked pretty recent. The pic was taken around 2:00PM. Anybody else back that day konw if it was there from Sat or before?
Practiced safe travel techniques on the way into the valley and performed compression, ECT and saw propagation tests along the way. Found CT15-17/Q2 fractures at approximately 12" and other tests showed reasonable stability. Especially compared to Saturday at Stevens. With that data we climbed to the saddle on the south part of the valley, completed some more tests on the other side and found our columns breaking at CT12/Q2.
Feeling Ok with our tests we dropped in on the backside on the S-SE face (looks like it is South of Cement, if anyone knows the "proper" name please reply). Snow was nice, I was hitting the crust (skis) but carving into it but John (snowboard) said he never felt it.
We climbed back up to the saddle and set a track up the ridgeline heading up towards Norse. Stopped at the first peak and had a great long run down as the sun was setting.
Saw some crowns that on the climb out from the backside of Bullion that looked pretty recent. The pic was taken around 2:00PM. Anybody else back that day konw if it was there from Sat or before?
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