Wasatch 23/24 Stoke Thread: Red Snake Coverage coming at you live from tgapp's fartba

Damn... Davis is the sketchiest centerpunch on Gobbs and the zone that released is always loaded to the gills. Ambitious line given the state of the snowpack. If the slide hadn't somehow exited the gulch proper where it makes a left and died down on the bench it could have been a very different outcome. You can see there is still some flow when dude looks up, the stuff that is still moving is close to where there's a significant rollover into a very deep gully.

Came out of WP later in the day yesterday, chatted with 3 very excited people at the bridge. They had centerpunched the birthday chutes cause it was one of their birthdays. Oooooof.

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Originally Posted by Dantheman

"We did a lot of things right today..."

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Yeah man! I think we are talking about close calls in the intermountain/continental snowpack parts of the Rockies primarily due to luck. I'll copy this in from a Slack chat I've been having.

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Holy crap! If only excellent word salad observations make up for shitty decision making. Accountability is a gift. Remember, its always our fault. "remote trigger" and "sympathetic release" seem to be the "black ice" of backcountry skiing these days.

Snowpack don't care how much Level 2 you can split nor how tight your flat bill/buff game. Do people just forget that there was a fatality recently near by not to long ago?

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Originally Posted by Boissal

Ambitious line given the state of the snowpack.

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Yellow rose is the new green rose

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Originally Posted by wasatchgravityresearch

Yellow rose is the new green rose

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Moderate with new snow and windslab =\= moderate with PWL

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Originally Posted by crankplank

Moderate with new snow and windslab =\= moderate with PWL

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I mean, as long as you have a gopro and and airbag they are both send it...right?

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Originally Posted by crankplank

Moderate with new snow and windslab =\= moderate with PWL

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I think that's that part that isn't registering. Considerable holds people back, the second it goes down to moderate it's go time regardless of what moderate we're talking about. I've griped in past seasons about the rose color crowd, peeps who skim the report and the only thing that registers are the visuals. Green = centerpunch everything, yellow = centerpunch everything after bouncing buzzwords at the top for a bit so everyone feels like they've taken all the steps needed to be safe, orange = go to Beartrap, red/black = stay home. Quite the nuanced approach...
PWL and the Birthday chutes haven't gone on their own during the big cycle? They're off limit til March. Thank jeebus my birthday's in June.

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Originally Posted by Boissal

Green = centerpunch everything, yellow = centerpunch everything after bouncing buzzwords at the top for a bit so everyone feels like they've taken all the steps needed to be safe, orange = go to Beartrap, red/black = stay home. Quite the nuanced approach...

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Post of the year material!

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Over here in the land of more weed and less snow, it seems we have a similar (but probably more dangerous snowpack) with the same decision making challenges and close calls.

What do ya'll think about this blurb from the UAC

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Bottom Line: it takes a LOT of homework - knowing slope history, knowing wind patterns, knowing which drainages have poor vs good structure, doing lots of probing and digging of snowpits and sharing of information to be able to ride steep terrain. And even then you may not get away with it. Human triggered avalanches are possible? No thanks.

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The Wasatch is a relatively small area with a lot of skier and observations and I don't objectively disagree with any of it. But is seems like it opens the door for those that like the smell of their own farts to justify increasing risky choices because of their perceived lots of homework. My take is that a persistent slab problem exhibits such a high degree of spacial variability that no snowpit test can green light the terrain.

I don't know. Its hard. There is no right answer.

I feel like that description covers the reality- if you do all this work, you can improve your chances, but you still might be wrong. Odds of being wrong are always in flux. The variability is the only constant. Someone died in a south facing slab avy last year here, I don't think anyone was waiting for that to happen.

Nothing UAC says can get everyone to weigh risk accurately. Imo, the vast majority of people who tour here are quite risk averse, read and comprehend the avy forecast and exhibit patience almost all of the time. Some people are hooked on steep powder and rationalize it in marginal conditions, and UAC can't change that.

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Originally Posted by crankplank

I feel like that description covers the reality- if you do all this work, you can improve your chances, but you still might be wrong. Odds of being wrong are always in flux. The variability is the only constant. Someone died in a south facing slab avy last year here, I don't think anyone was waiting for that to happen.

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My take is that there can be a lot of false signals in the data, so you're technically "right" but you've actually just confirmation biased yourself into ignoring the larger reality of the snowpack. Alecs Barton is the best example that immediately comes to mind, but there have been many others. There's one particular local badass I follow on Strava who has been skiing some stuff lately that has me just shaking my head and praying she doesn't get killed. She has kids and seems smarter than this, I don't get it.

Its definitely scary Moderate out there, I traveled across many LCC zones from Monte Cristo to Main Days over the weekend. A quick hand pit can tell you all you need to know in some places - Main Days, deeper snow, a 6-8 inch solid bridge layer in there, where as on HoD (Monte Cristo BCC side) it was was shallow, 4 inch bridge layer, with pea sized facets underneath. Bailed on HoD and went back up and over to better snow and fun outcomes.

@Boissel, I don't think Bday chutes are necessarily a bad call on a day like yesterday IMO. I've skied them on and off all year. Seen the flushing from the cycles and with some entry tactics / strategy + good decision making. If the guy just hit mach 1 on entry and didnt slope cut / feel the snow on the peripheries etc. I would agree, putting a lot of eggs in a basket while walking atop marbles.

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Originally Posted by D-Roc

Its definitely scary Moderate out there, I traveled across many LCC zones from Monte Cristo to Main Days over the weekend. A quick hand pit can tell you all you need to know in some places - Main Days, deeper snow, a 6-8 inch solid bridge layer in there, where as on HoD (Monte Cristo BCC side) it was was shallow, 4 inch bridge layer, with pea sized facets underneath. Bailed on HoD and went back up and over to better snow and fun outcomes.

@Boissel, I don't think Bday chutes are necessarily a bad call on a day like yesterday IMO. I've skied them on and off all year. Seen the flushing from the cycles and with some entry tactics / strategy + good decision making. If the guy just hit mach 1 on entry and didnt slope cut / feel the snow on the peripheries etc. I would agree, putting a lot of eggs in a basket while walking atop marbles.

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Not buying it. Risk tolerance aside, you can't not touch the entrance rollover on the Birthdays. Sure, you don't have to ski cut and stop in the middle, but there's no sneaking in any of the 3 chutes without going over a massive convexity at a perfect 35 degree angle, or cutting in directly below it into the steepest part of the gut. The top of the lines also happens to be one of the most wind loaded sections of ridge anywhere in the range. Remember some years back when 2 dudes got lanched in there late in the day and miraculously survived? The crown face was damn near 10' tall at its deepest, took the rest of the season for it to fill in. Those lines flush repeatedly when it's dumping and windy. It's like peeling an onion, 6 to 12" at a time running on the wind skin, and refilling in no time. Meanwhile the facets are chilling, slowly getting more and more weight on them, the fuse getting shorter and shorter until the whole thing blows up.

I love that zone, I ski up there way more than anywhere else, and not always when it's objectively green light. I've made some high speed entrances in the gut in order to spend as little time as possible on the convexity, tickling it as gently as I could then hauling ass out of there. Not smart but once in the flats looking back it's easy to rationalize that it was the right call and skiing it that way is "safe". You couldn't pay me to go put my fat ass on that slope right now though. I objectively can't think of a zone I'd be less comfortable dropping into. Personally I like my bridges to >4 feet thick when there's rot in the snowpack.

Not judging you here, just pointing out that your reasoning doesn't work for me. I'm totally judging the dude I talked to though, he was a 100% a kook.

Edit: found it here: https://utahavalanchecenter.org/avalanche/28902
December 2016, earlier in the season by a month but a similar sandwich snowpack. Rotten layer, this one on the ground instead of facets sitting in the cold for a while, massive storm, winds, things calming down and warming up. No other signs of instability. Second rider on the slope, before getting to the rollover proper from the report. And clearly the gods were looking the other way.

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Originally Posted by Boissal

Not buying it. Risk tolerance aside, you can't not touch the entrance rollover on the Birthdays. Sure, you don't have to ski cut and stop in the middle, but there's no sneaking in any of the 3 chutes without going over a massive convexity at a perfect 35 degree angle, or cutting in directly below it into the steepest part of the gut. The top of the lines also happens to be one of the most wind loaded sections of ridge anywhere in the range. Remember some years back when 2 dudes got lanched in there late in the day and miraculously survived? The crown face was damn near 10' tall at its deepest, took the rest of the season for it to fill in. Those lines flush repeatedly when it's dumping and windy. It's like peeling an onion, 6 to 12" at a time running on the wind skin, and refilling in no time. Meanwhile the facets are chilling, slowly getting more and more weight on them, the fuse getting shorter and shorter until the whole thing blows up.

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Judge away not going to skewer my skin, I have history for sure.

Ill reiterate 'not necessarily a bad call' means there are better ones to make too... never said right call. I also stated 'entry tactics' to avoid said convexity etc.

You know because I do a lot of things right these days...:fm:

The corn skiing was great in Mineral yesterday. The south facing is going to take a beating this week.
Thinking about a winter mountain biking trip to Sedona. My enthusiasm in skiing this season is waning quickly..
Scary moderate... my favorite.

Haven’t been skiing in the Wasatch in 4+ years. Forgot how much I loved the skiing here, especially with walk on trams. The shady steeps skied great today, chalky and soft, depending on where you make your turns.

I just might start coming back during midwinter high pressure more frequently…

Yes, you've got to love Monday's in LCC. Walk on trams. No lift lines. Good snow. Skiing with like-minded buddies

The Bird is one of the best not powder skiing mountains around. Steep, high, north facing is the way. My friends ski ski Great Scott all day.

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Originally Posted by Boissal

Not buying it. Risk tolerance aside, you can't not touch the entrance rollover on the Birthdays. Sure, you don't have to ski cut and stop in the middle, but there's no sneaking in any of the 3 chutes without going over a massive convexity at a perfect 35 degree angle, or cutting in directly below it into the steepest part of the gut. The top of the lines also happens to be one of the most wind loaded sections of ridge anywhere in the range. Remember some years back when 2 dudes got lanched in there late in the day and miraculously survived? The crown face was damn near 10' tall at its deepest, took the rest of the season for it to fill in. Those lines flush repeatedly when it's dumping and windy. It's like peeling an onion, 6 to 12" at a time running on the wind skin, and refilling in no time. Meanwhile the facets are chilling, slowly getting more and more weight on them, the fuse getting shorter and shorter until the whole thing blows up.

I love that zone, I ski up there way more than anywhere else, and not always when it's objectively green light. I've made some high speed entrances in the gut in order to spend as little time as possible on the convexity, tickling it as gently as I could then hauling ass out of there. Not smart but once in the flats looking back it's easy to rationalize that it was the right call and skiing it that way is "safe". You couldn't pay me to go put my fat ass on that slope right now though. I objectively can't think of a zone I'd be less comfortable dropping into. Personally I like my bridges to >4 feet thick when there's rot in the snowpack.

Not judging you here, just pointing out that your reasoning doesn't work for me. I'm totally judging the dude I talked to though, he was a 100% a kook.

Edit: found it here: https://utahavalanchecenter.org/avalanche/28902
December 2016, earlier in the season by a month but a similar sandwich snowpack. Rotten layer, this one on the ground instead of facets sitting in the cold for a while, massive storm, winds, things calming down and warming up. No other signs of instability. Second rider on the slope, before getting to the rollover proper from the report. And clearly the gods were looking the other way.

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I'm not a Utah skier but this triggered a memory from a The Avalanche Hour podcast. This slide discussed in episode 2.6 which was a two part episode and both party members were interviewed. It was a hell of a story and those guys were quite lucky.

Agreed! Everyone should book their vacation and use their Ikon passes at The Bird! hands down the best with no new snow or with 2' of powder! I can't believe anyone comes to Utah to ski anywhere else.

snowbird.com

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Originally Posted by muted reborn

Agreed! Everyone should book their vacation and use their Ikon passes at The Bird! hands down the best with no new snow or with 2' of powder! I can't believe anyone comes to Utah to ski anywhere else.

snowbird.com

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Don't forget free parking too!!

I sat in traffic Saturday and Sunday, blue sky, dry roads, 30+ minutes to entry 1. It seems Brighton and Soli cracking down on parking has shifted the masses up the the Bird.

Saturday traffic cause was hilarious to me... Some car stuck off the side in some trailhead with two people stopped trying to help dig them out. Ton's of rubber-banding and immediate speed-up once we passed them. Not local to know the actual trailhead but I was laughing the rest of the way up the canyon.

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Originally Posted by muted reborn

Agreed! Everyone should book their vacation and use their Ikon passes at The Bird! hands down the best with no new snow or with 2' of powder! I can't believe anyone comes to Utah to ski anywhere else.

snowbird.com

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You’re ruining my future “no snow high pressure chalky steep” chasing plans, keep that place quiet

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Originally Posted by Yukonrider

Don't forget free parking too!!

I sat in traffic Saturday and Sunday, blue sky, dry roads, 30+ minutes to entry 1. It seems Brighton and Soli cracking down on parking has shifted the masses up the the Bird.

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When parking is tight, most locals take an Uber for $50. Split it with 4 friends and you are golden. Only $20 more than reserved parking! Also the bus is an easy option for visitors.

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Originally Posted by thefortrees

You’re ruining my future “no snow high pressure chalky steep” chasing plans, keep that place quiet

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I don't want gatekeep from people getting walk-on trams, steep chalky runs weeks after the last snowfall, and free parking. but don't listen to me, there's a bunch of vocal people raving about The Bird in this thread. iI's the place to be.

And if anyone needs discounted tickets, PM thebirdhunter, he loves to hook up visitors.

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Originally Posted by Dantheman

"We did a lot of things right today..."

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Gold.

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Originally Posted by thefortrees

You’re ruining my future “no snow high pressure chalky steep” chasing plans, keep that place quiet

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There's this other low key spot called mammoth, don't tell too many people

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