Crystal Lakes 2/25 - Use Caution Tomorrow

Toured into Crystal Lakes today.  Dropped in, at the start of the three way chutes.  Dug a pit and saw no result on first compression test and CT23 on second test on what we think is a buried surface hoar layer.  We knew about a slide in Park Place the day before and had other first hand reports of instability in the area over the past few days and had read the NWAC report.  We picked our run with these reports in mind.  We skied the line twice down to the lakes.  On the first run we were the first party to ski the slope.  On the second lap, 4-5 other skiers had skied the same slope.  On our third lap, I triggered a slide, but was not caught.  Crown was 1-2 feet deep, around 50m+ wide, ran around 500 feet (these are all approximations).  Debris fanned out and I doubt it was burial depth, but certainly could have done a lot of damage had it carried me into the trees.  From my partners account, the slide started very small, a little pocket isolated to a convex roll that did not look particularly substantial at first, but then propagated quickly once it picked up momentum.  Just a heads up to be safe out there and to not assume slopes with tracks are safe.  The layer seems stubborn and not particularly reactive, but if you hit the right spot it will go.