Cooke City

Skied south of Cooke over the weekend. Winds were L-M gusting to X out of the W, SW. 19" HN at 8500' from Friday night to Sunday afternoon. Small, localized cracking of wind slabs, but they weren't as reactive as I would have expected. No avalanches seen, although visibility was limited. There are some density changes within the storm snow, including a layer of graupel. Storm snow was not reactive in hand pits. On solar aspects, there is a MF crust under the recent storm snow and facets under the crust. The crust varies in thickness depending on aspect and elevation, 1-3cm.

Skied north of Cooke City. Lots of cracking and small slabs on pillows. Observed one small wind slab on NW facing slope 9200 ft. Photo: BPG

Skied north of Cooke City. Lots of cracking and small slabs on pillows. Photo: BPG

Skied north of Cooke City. Lots of cracking and small slabs on pillows. Observed one small wind slab on NW facing slope 9200 ft.

Observed a large wet loose (D1) in Zimmer Creek today off SE facing cliffs. Likely happened 1/29. There were also other smaller wet loose avalanches nearby on south facing cliffs 

On Jan 30 we spotted several loose wet avalanches that occurred yesterday in steep, rocky terrain up Sheep Creek. Photo: GNFAC

On Jan 30 we noted an old, deep persistent slab avalanche on a NW' aspect near the south end of the Republic Creek drainage. This likely broke around a week ago. Photo: GNFAC