March 29
Starting at the end of the road in LCC, soon noticing there was instability in the snow, first by viewing a roof avalanche and considerable wind load on the lee side.
A gallery of the day with associated slides and observations can be found here.
East bowl of Silver Fork provided good skiing after ski cutting out the wind drifts near the ridge.
We proceeded over to the west bowl encountering another group and plenty of bodies for the trail breaking.
Why is this guy smiling?
An avalanche professional has time to enjoy the powder before heading down, entering the virtual world.
Weather:
Snow flurries to partial clearing to overcast to heavy snow. Moderate temperatures.
Snow:
Snow line hovered between 6 and 7’000 feet. Amounts were variable with a bit over a foot around Alta somewhat less in upper Silver Fork and 14+ inches in mid elevations of Days Fork. Part of the variability was from the wind compaction at the upper elevations.
Several slides were released slope cutting and natural slides were also observed. The initiated slide into Oingo Boingo stepped down to older snow layering possibly faceted light density. Sun and warm temperatures did not play a role.
Slope cutting on the mid elevation exit from main Days produced only sluffing and the end of the dry snow, with the trail out Days Fork crunchy from the heavy wet snow and rain.
Bottom Line:
I’d expect today’s instabilities to have mostly settled out. As indicated by the Oingo Boingo slide there are some isolated areas with active weak older snow. That layering would continue to pose a hazard, as would the further new snowfall, especially if the sun and or warm temperatures become a factor.