Drove up to Bridger at noon and saw a large avalanche on along the road north of the fire station... The slope with cornices hadn’t slid at this point. On the way home at 3:30 the larger slope with cornices had slid. It was very big, possibly R5. 1.5-2’ deep, 200’ wide, huge chunks of hard slab and cornice. Looks like new wind-loaded snow with some gouges into older snow. Photo: GNFAC
Drove up to Bridger at noon and saw a large avalanche on along the road north of the fire station... The slope with cornices hadn’t slid at this point. On the way home at 3:30 the larger slope with cornices had slid. It was very big, possibly R5. 1.5-2’ deep, 200’ wide, huge chunks of hard slab and cornice. Looks like new wind-loaded snow with some gouges into older snow. Photo: GNFAC
Drove up to Bridger at noon and saw a large avalanche on along the road north of the fire station. It was 75’ wide, 1-1.5’ deep and 25’ vertical. HS-N-R4-D1.5/2. It was on an east facing slope, south of the long slope that has cornices. The slope with cornices hadn’t slid at this point. On the way home at 3:30 the larger slope with cornices had slid. It was very big, possibly R5. 1.5-2’ deep, 200’ wide, huge chunks of hard slab and cornice. Looks like new wind-loaded snow with some gouges into older snow.
From Olson creek I had a cloud free flat light view of the ridge from Saddle to Bridger Peak and looked with binoculars. There was a wind slab just north of quarter saddle that did not go over the cliffs. Probably 1-2’ deep, 30’ wide of new snow. There was a large wind slab on the north half of Between the Peaks (250’ wide) and one similar depth wind slab in the Pinnacles (100’ wide). Both of these broke 1-3’ deep immediately below the cornice and did not entrain much snow or propagate very wide or downslope given how much new snow there was. I could see the debris from the slide between the peaks which ran over 1000’ vertical to the top of the runout zone but relatively low volume.
We snowmobiled and skied near the Throne and stayed on slopes less than 30 degrees and out from below any slopes steeper than 30 degrees. At 11:00am at 7,500' we measured 14" of new snow equal to 1.2" of snow water equivalent. It was snowing one inch an hour and wind was moderate with strong gusts. Avalanches of new snow were likely on steep slopes and very likely on steep wind-loaded slopes. Conditions will get more dangerous as more new snow is expected over the next couple days. We dug a pit at 7,500' on a northeast aspect. HS was 157cm and we did not see any reactive or concerning weak layers, but the new snow and wind-drifts are enough to create large, dangerous avalanches.
Triggered a couple small slides on the cornices that typically form in the corridor here: 45.91263, -110.95506
wind was blowing in strong gusts and it started snowing very heavy around 1pm
super reactive. Approached the small slope and the whole thing went. It was only 2-3 inches deep. Likely from wind blown today and some of what was falling. It did run for about 40-50 wide. Nothing that would bury a person but definitely a telling sign.
Triggered a couple small slides on the cornices that typically form in the corridor here: 45.91263, -110.95506
wind was blowing in strong gusts and it started snowing very heavy around 1pm
super reactive. Approved the small slope and the whole thing went. It was only 2-3 inches deep. Likely from wind blown today and some of what was falling. It did run for about 40-50 wide. Nothing that would bury a person but definitely a telling sign.
We were snowshoeing up Grassy Mountain on Feb 15. We were following someone else’s tracks up to a SW facing slope between 35 and 40 degrees at 6400 feet (directly across from Bridger Bowl). We realized the other person had probably turned around because of this crack in the snowpack directly above a gully with terrain traps. We did the same.
