Dug a pit near the top of bacon rind on an east facing slope. ECT-P 14 on the new snow slab breaking 12” deep
We rode into Taylor Fork, to the ridge at sunlight basin, through Carrot basin to the wilderness boundary, and back along the ridge to Beaver slide. There was 12" of new snow equal to 1.25" SWE.
Wind was calm, and skies were partly sunny with clouds obscuring Sage Peak, Skyline and areas to the south. The recent snow had not been affected by wind anywhere. The ridge near the weather station that is normally scoured still had 8"+ of light new snow on it. Sunny slopes got moist in the afternoon.
The only new avalanche I saw was one slope with small debris from a loose snow slide/ or new snow/wind slab on Kirkwood Ridge.
We dug a pit near the wilderness boundary where Ian and Dave dug earlier in the week. We had ECTP13 and ECTP18 on the recently buried layer of small facets below a 2" crust under the 12" of new snow.
We toured over south Bacon Rind and into Ernie Miller Ridge today. The weather was variable, alternating between periods of calm winds and warm sun, and periods of heavy cloud cover, snow, and high winds. At the summit winds were strong out of the SW, but previous wind deposits further down pointed towards recent Northerly winds. These were strong enough to scour snow off the crust, and create drifts up to a foot deep. The sun was also affecting the snow surface, rapidly warming and wetting the snow above the crust. This wet snow was not bonding well to the crust. Some cold snow remained and made for good skiing.
We took the variability of the snowpack and the risks of a consequential slide into account and traveled through moderate terrain, avoiding excessive exposure.
The notable avalanche activity in the Taylor Fork was a full-depth wet slab avalanche that broke last week during the warm-up on Lightning Ridge.
We saw one new wind-slab avalanche in Sunlight Basin. It was small. From a distance, it appeared to be about 6" deep and 30' across (R1-D1).
