24-25

Date

Fri, 02/14/2025 - 06:20

Activity

Skiing

We snowmobiled and skiied around the northern bridgers yesterday. Found lots of wind effect. Most faces had been wind scoured, some protected south facing slopes were wind loaded. Noted a few small natural slides, one other group reported to us that they popped a wind slab on a south facing slope. We bailed on our bigger objectives and found some decent snow in a sheltered south facing chute, we did not experience any instability on this but I'm sure on other slopes we would have seen wind slabs. A thicker wind crust was developing in most areas. Snow pack seemed really solid and deep, except near cliffs and hidden rock piles, were we found facets to the ground.

Region

Bridger Range

Location (from list)

Fairy Lake

Wind slab in south cottonwood

Date

Thu, 02/13/2025 - 03:50

Toured up around Blackmore and s cottonwood. Found an extremely reactive windslab in the afternoon. It was thin, but easily triggered and would propagate about the width of each terrain feature (20-50ft). Each slab ran the length of the slope (150-200 ft).

Observer Name

Jay Alford

GNFAC Avalanche Forecast for Fri Feb 14, 2025

Snowpack and Avalanche Discussion

Wind slab avalanches are the primary concern today. There are a couple inches of new snow already, with a few more on the way today and winds strong enough to drift that new snow. Thin fresh drifts will be easily triggered today. Triggering older, somewhat thicker wind slabs that formed with high winds over the last couple days is also a possibility.

Persistent Slab avalanches are still possible, breaking a couple feet deep on weak layers that formed at the end of January, as evidenced by a small slide triggered yesterday in the Lionhead area (<a href="https://www.mtavalanche.com/node/34156"><…;), an avalanche near Cooke City triggered by a cornice within the last 36 hours that looks have broken on deeper weak layers (<a href="https://www.mtavalanche.com/images/25/cornice-triggered-avalanche-miner…;) and a couple slides in the Taylor Fork that likely broke last weekend (<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wZ3k35z5Ej8&embeds_referring_euri=h… Fork video</a>). These slides are more likely to be triggered on windloaded slopes, with thicker and more cohesive slabs.

Identifying and avoiding windloaded slopes is the best strategy to reduce your chances of triggering any sort of avalanche today.

The avalanche danger is MODERATE.

Wind slab avalanches are also the primary avalanche problem around Bozeman and Big Sky. It hasn’t snowed much yet and not too much will pile up today, but even without new snow yesterday, we got reports of active wind loading and several small slides (<a href="https://www.mtavalanche.com/node/34144"><… fork of Hyalite observation</a>, <a href="https://www.mtavalanche.com/node/34137"><…. Blackmore observation</a>).

Identifying areas of wind deposited snow and either avoiding them or assessing how well they’ve bonded is the primary risk management recommendation today. Persistent weak layers are less widespread in these areas compared with further south, but keeping your eye out for them (by digging a snowpit) is still not a bad idea

The avalanche danger is MODERATE today on wind loaded slopes and LOW on non-wind loaded slopes.