Wasatch Conditions 09-10

**Trackhead** · 02-03-2010, 09:11 AM

Originally Posted by ZachClanton

Looks familiar.

**lakeaffected** · 02-03-2010, 09:44 AM

^^^^^^^ pen's getting bigger...

**skifishbum** · 02-03-2010, 12:06 PM

Originally Posted by lakeaffected

^^^^^^^ pen's getting bigger...

Killer ob JONG

Here's some not worthy goat fuck cheapass helmet cam from Fri. Pit results that day were quite variable overall ct high teens a few ct 10's, q2 in large grainular oct/ nov ground facets but full rueschblock scored a surpriingly well rb6 failing on old snow/storm cycle facets and not ground.
In the video you can look across the Silver Fork valley and see the meadows slide path that sadly took the life of a skier.
This skier wasn't a "fuckin Gaper" he was an experienced local bc skier and member of the community or tribe who sadly made mistakes during a period of suspect snow stability when such mistakes can lead to dire consquences.
Vibes to his family and friends
Feel free to critque our being in the bc, line chose or my converted oneplaker partners style or anything else you armchair asshats feel the need to blab about.

**Skidog** · 02-03-2010, 12:13 PM

Originally Posted by skifishbum

Killer ob JONG

Here's some not worthy goat fuck cheapass helmet cam from Fri. Pit results that day were quite variable overall ct high teens a few ct 10's, q2 in large grainular oct/ nov ground facets but full rueschblock scored a surpriingly well rb6 failing on old snow/storm cycle facets and not ground.
In the video you can look across the Silver Fork valley and see the meadows slide path that sadly took the life of a skier.
This skier wasn't a "fuckin Gaper" he was an experienced local bc skier and member of the community or tribe who sadly made mistakes during a period of suspect snow stability when such mistakes can lead to dire consquences.
Vibes to his family and friends
Feel free to critque our being in the bc, line chose or my converted oneplaker partners style or anything else you armchair asshats feel the need to blab about.

When you taking me out and showing me all this glorious stuff?

**ZachClanton** · 02-03-2010, 04:13 PM

Trackhead,
You guys got much better clouds for the shot! Whatta line though... somthin I've wanted to do for years now and a summer favorite.

**Mark H** · 02-03-2010, 06:19 PM

Zach Clanton and Co.

Never get tired of seeing the Cottonwood skyline

Found settled pow on the Cabin Run (northwest face of Gobblers). No instability noticed

**powdork** · 02-03-2010, 08:56 PM

so we went to altabird today, where it was ok
started in mineral basin

then dropped into something on the backside of catherines- tahoetrash

hiking back out led us to some decent almost north facing lines that had already been hit pretty hard. and some colorado dude hitting it pretty hard

tahoetrash says this is simliar to tahoe pow, except it's pow.

the top part of patsy marley's (i think) was a bit wind/sun fucked, but the bottom was only sun affected and we were there at the height of that affectation

patsy marley's, right?

wassup with the castle's area??

**ectreeskier11** · 02-05-2010, 08:42 AM

anyone been into white pine (lcc) lately? we are thinking about possibly hitting some mini golf lines up there, but i haven't seen any recent obs either here or on the UAC site. obviously not going to jump into anything gnarly.

**skifishbum** · 02-05-2010, 08:46 AM

Observed this the other day in the Spruces lot

Yesterdays UAC forcast had a great description of whats going on with our snowpack/conditions from Udots perspective nice to read something aside from what seems like the doom and gloom that has been posted lately.
Yo skidog any time you want to dig glorious rueschblocks while I kick it on safety break

call me. Fuckers are time consuming but a good indication of stability and force needed to break the snowpack bond over a larger test area

i'd imagine there'd be some good skiing involved too

**The Gnarwhale** · 02-05-2010, 07:21 PM

meadowskippery cont'd. I've been on almost nothing over low-30s for the past dozen days out and I'm ready for a change. Time for night biking on the nordic trails or something...

looks like tilt-shift, but no, just snow on the lens

s and w have an unpleasant crust an inch or three down. other aspects were creamy

**Trackhead** · 02-05-2010, 07:38 PM

Originally Posted by The Gnarwhale

I've been on almost nothing over low-30s for the past dozen days out and I'm ready for a change. Time for night biking on the nordic trails or something...

Get some skate skis and fruit boots and get ready for the 65 mile, in a day, Highline Traverse with me and Guy, or..........go south, there's snow in places there usually isn't.

**ectreeskier11** · 02-05-2010, 08:00 PM

white pine- skied west side (east facing), maybe up to 9 or 9500, mostly treed, confident enough to ski a couple pitches reaching maybe 40 degrees. dug a big pit, reusch block test, strangely the only thing we could get to break was in the top layer (before the graupel layer, around 30 inches down, which looked gnarly but didn't produce anything), maybe a q2-3 shear there but was confident it wouldn't produce anything more than a bit of slough. probed to 165cm, obviously there is that faceting layer on the bottom that is beginning to compress and strengthen a bit, but we didn't see much in the way of crusts, and found a pretty decent and right side up snowpack. really the only thing i was worried about was the graupel layer, but it didn't produce anything, the faceted snow on the bottom appeared to have been bridged fairly well in this area. this is kind of my first obs., and i have had a couple beers, so don't read into it to much, but any criticism is welcome!

**Dantheman** · 02-05-2010, 08:19 PM

Originally Posted by powdork

hiking back out led us to some decent almost north facing lines that had already been hit pretty hard. and some colorado dude hitting it pretty hard

No fucking way you could get me to go hucking in Rocky Point right now. NE facing, 35-40 degrees, high elevation, pretty much exactly where all the death slabs have been releasing.

**wra** · 02-05-2010, 08:31 PM

Could you critique this one?

**sfotex** · 02-05-2010, 08:34 PM

Originally Posted by Dantheman

No fucking way you could get me to go hucking in Rocky Point right now. NE facing, 35-40 degrees, high elevation, pretty much exactly where all the death slabs have been releasing.

DTM,
That's just the latest slope stability test they're teaching in Avy 4

**Trackhead** · 02-05-2010, 08:35 PM

Originally Posted by wra

Could you critique this one?

Bread and butter.

**yemntftb** · 02-05-2010, 09:26 PM

Originally Posted by Dantheman

No fucking way you could get me to go hucking in Rocky Point right now. NE facing, 35-40 degrees, high elevation, pretty much exactly where all the death slabs have been releasing.

Great picture of my buddy from two days ago. as for instability, non were noted in our compression tests and a majority of those slopes went a few storm cycles ago. over the past two days skied several different shots in there and its skiing great...minus all the snowmobile tracks. Someone even sacked up and skied sunset peak from the top...in one turn.
-TJ

**powdork** · 02-06-2010, 01:56 AM

was that you we saw you on Patsy Marley's then?

Didn't know where you were going at first, so we wanted to get what we came for before anyone else did. Afterward we were kicking ourselves for not hanging and picking up some local knowledge.

**skifishbum** · 02-06-2010, 07:18 AM

Originally Posted by Trackhead

Bread and butter.

with strawberry jam to top it off.
I'm a bit confused on those 2 other obs are you telling us you dug a pit to the ground isolated a coloum and were unable to get it to fail by full shoulder blows to a shovel placed on top that coloum? Full on ct 30 blows? or are you performing different compression tests? and the wp coloums only failed 30cm down on grapel those wouldn't fail on the ground facets either?
Just curious haven't been over lcc way but definately not what I'm seeing in bcc n nw facing pits on + 30 degree slopes ~ 10k

**thin cover** · 02-06-2010, 11:49 AM

Last couple days in BCC and then Suicide Chute yesterday morning. Excellent snow and good times.

A very happy whapworth, suicide was shin deep hero

**bptempleton** · 02-06-2010, 11:31 PM

I'm a backcountry jong, but have some experience using beacons and probes. I really need to learn how to do Rutschblock (sp?) tests and various other tests. I've read about them in Tremper's book and tried them in mellow terrain, but not really sure if I'm doing it all right. Myself and a buddy are looking to get in the BC tomorrow, any one have any tips where we should go/ wanna take us up? A friend told us to check out White Pine. Thoughts?

**skifishbum** · 02-07-2010, 07:33 AM

Been a month since I've been up to the happy place I named my pooch after.
My obs from argenta /kessler. Sunpopped out a few times giving us nice views of mineral millb and Broads

I'd have to agree wih udots Mkee snow on way up felt quite sandboxy and his pit profile was similiar to what was found in the argenta headwall a suggary /sandy hollow mess. The steep headwall naturaled repeatedly in dec and evidence from recent repeats was visable.
Once reaching the top of the headwall and heading up the ridge on the w sw
aspect the snowpack sucked collapsing and fracturing q1 on ground facets on a shallow 2' to 4' snowpack.
Zach who I didn't put togather as being ZC till last night stopped in a sheltered group of trees to dig a pit . My wife, Packy and Zachs roomate? Toph were trying to stay on the ridgeline skinning from tree to tree. I was 70' or so above on the skintrack when it collapsed and pushed zach down 10' or so into the trees.
There was a good 50' of hang fire between zach and I . Comunication revelead Zach was okay his slitter partner was okay and the group behind us were not involved. Toph skirted back down away from the hf and helped zach recover his gear and they took pics and i"d imagine sent info to UAC.
my pic from above.

I'll let zach add details if he wants as I stayed above with my now slightly freaked out wife

We continued up to the Ne coluiar and E ramp. The guys dropped a small cornice into the coluiar that only sluffed and a pit on the E ramp revealed a ~ 4' snowpack failing ct mid 20's on 6" of 4 finger ground facets. The ramp skied great as did the shoulder down to donut falls trail, but S E aspects of gully lower down were slightly sun affected.
Damn glad to meet ya Zach and glad everything turned out alright.

**The Gnarwhale** · 02-07-2010, 09:49 AM

^woah, glad everyone's alright.

Went east for some brapping and cornice cutting.

The snowpacks not much over a meter and with plenty of facets down low, but column fractures were low energy and reluctant to pop

**PROVO** · 02-07-2010, 10:01 AM

thanks for cutting the cornice jim! those things get beastly on that ridge.

^^^ZachC, close call man. Glad you didn't get smashed against a tree. That incident further emphasizes the pockety nature of sketchyness out there