Recent Avalanches and New Snow

Recent Avalanches and New Snow

Date
Activity
Snowmobiling

We rode into Yale Creek today. At the head of the creek, we stopped and dug on a south-facing slope at 9000'. We found 30" of new snow that has fallen over the last week on top of an already unstable snowpack. From here we continued up Yale Creek and on a small NE-facing slope, we saw an avalanche that was triggered by snowmobilers within the last couple of days. This avalanche was 2-3' deep and 100 feet wide and failed on weak faceted snow near the ground. It did not run far vertically because it was such a small slope. We dug near here on a SE facing slope and saw a similar setup as earlier with 30"+ of new snow overlaying weak snow. 

On our way out, we saw a small freshly triggered avalanche. This was in a small gully and failed on weak snow near the ground 1-2' deep. With poor visibility, we did not get an opportunity to see any avalanches on larger slopes. However, seeing avalanches on small protected slopes is a good indicator that there are likely avalanches on larger steep slopes we could not see. 

Wind was calm to light out of the south and snow continued through the day, with 1-2" of snow falling while we rode. 

Region
Island Park
Location (from list)
Yale Creek
Observer Name
Zach Peterson