Observer Name
Ted Scroggin/Craig Gordon/Trent Meisenheimer
Observation Date
Thursday, January 23, 2014
Avalanche Date
Monday, January 20, 2014
Region
Uintas » Bear River Ranger District » Whitney Basin
Location Name or Route
Double Hill
Elevation
10,500'
Aspect
East
Slope Angle
37°
Trigger
Snowmobiler
Trigger: additional info
Unintentionally Triggered
Avalanche Type
Hard Slab
Avalanche Problem
Persistent Weak Layer
Weak Layer
Depth Hoar
Depth
12'
Width
400'
Vertical
800'
Comments
This quite deep avalanche was likely triggered over the past holiday weekend, possibly on Monday. I'm guessing the trigger point was on the lookers left where a couple of sled tracks enter the slope and was likely a shallow spot? Pretty darn amazing how deep this slide broke into a heavy wind drifted slope. Getting caught in a deep hard slab avalanche like this one would be game over.
Comments
The first photo might be the likely trigger point where a couple of sled tracks enter the slope. This could have been just shallow enough for a rider to collapse the slope and once the fracture propagated uphill it pulled-out this very deep hard slab. I did not see any excavation holes, so I'm assuming the rider was able to escape this large avalanche?
Comments
Visited Double Hill today and it was double overhead. Very impressive slide triggered in a shallow portion of the lookers left flank. Super lucky there weren't a slew of riders on the slope at the same time otherwise this story wouldn't have a happy ending.
Video
Coordinates