General Snow Conditions for the Turnagain Area - Updated As Necessary |
| Date | Snow Condition Update |
| Saturday, April 10th 2010 | GLIDE CRACK AVALANCHES
-Three glide cracks avalanched today: south face of Eddies, south face of Shark Fin, west aspect in the Skookum Valley. |
| Friday, April 9th 2010 | SKI-CUT AVALANCHES
-Ski-cutting windslabs on the north chutes of Pete's North resulted in four small to medium sized avalanches. The biggest one was 40 feet wide, 18 inches deep, and 900 feet long. |
| Wednesday, April 7th 2010 | GLIDE CRACK AVALANCHE
-small full depth release/glide crack avalanched on southern aspect of Tincan |
| Tuesday, April 6th 2010 | NATURAL AVLANCHES
Dozens of point release and some shallow surface slab avalanches were triggered almost immediately after the sun broke out. |
| Tuesday, April 6th 2010 | Parking Lot Snow Stake Totals:
Eddies Lot: 5 inches new snow
Motorized Lot: 8 inches new snow
Sunburst Lot: 2 inches new snow
Johnson Pass North Lot: 2 inches new snow |
| Monday, April 5th 2010 | Parking Lot Snow Stake Measurements:
Eddies Lot: 30" new snow
Motorized Lot: 25" new snow
Sunburst Lot: 11" new snow
Johnson Pass North Lot: 12" new snow |
| Saturday, April 3rd 2010 | GLIDE CRACK AVALANCHES
Several glide cracks avalanched in Turnagain Pass in the heat of the day...one on the south face of Shark Fin and the other one on Sunnyside just above the snowmachine uptrack. |
| Friday, April 2nd 2010 | NATURAL AVALANCHES
Numerous medium-sized naturals observed at the tail end of the storm on N-NE-SW aspects (see photo gallery). |
| Thursday, April 1st 2010 | Parking Lot Snow Stake Measurments:
Eddies Lot: 13 inches new snow
Motorized Lot: 16 inches new snow
Sunburst Lot: 9 inches new snow
Johnson Pass North Lot: 4 inches new snow |
| Wednesday, March 31st 2010 | Parking Lot Snow Stake Measurments:
Eddies Lot: 3 inches new snow
Motorized Lot: 3 inches new snow
Sunburst Lot: 2 inches new snow
Johnson Pass North Lot: 0 inches new snow |
| Tuesday, March 30th 2010 | NATURAL AVALANCHES
-Seattle Creek (see photo gallery)
-Big Chief (see photo gallery)
-Pyramid (see photo gallery)
-Warm Up Bowl (see photo gallery)
-Cornbiscuit (see photo gallery)
FULL DEPTH CLIMAX AVALANCHE
-Goat Ridge Girdwood Valley (see photo gallery) |
| Monday, March 29th 2010 | Parking Lot Snow Stake Measurements:
Eddies Lot: 5" new snow
Motorized Lot: 5" new snow
Sunburst Lot: 2" new snow
Johnson Pass North: 1" new snow |
| Monday, March 29th 2010 | Natural Avalanche
-Sun-triggered slab avalanche on Sunnyside (see photo gallery)
-Sun-triggered slab avalanche in Portage Valley Williwaw Peak (see photo gallery)
-Several other sun-triggered slab avalanches in Turnagain Arm area |
| Sunday, March 28th 2010 | NATURAL AVALANCHES
-Recent natural on south face of Sunburst that broke 60 feet wide, ran downslope a bit, then fractured an additional 60 feet to one side.
-Recent natural in Todd’s Run on the north side of Tincan that ran 1000 feet. |
| Sunday, March 28th 2010 | Parking Lots Snow Stake Measurements:
Eddies Lot: 16" new
Motorized Lot: 16" new
Sunburst Lot: 9" new
Johnson Pass North Lot: 3" new |
| Sunday, March 28th 2010 | Natural Avalanches
-Tincan Proper
-Library
-Sunburst
Human-Triggered Avalanche
Ski cut on steep test slope on Tincan 2-2.5 feet deep 40 feet wide. Good indicator that storm snow from Sat night 3/27/2010 is a slab that is not bonding well to crusts. |
| Saturday, March 27th 2010 | 15 inches of heavy wet snow fell in Turnagain Pass while 17 inches fell in Grandview, 16-24 inches in the upper elevations of the Girdwood Valley, and 3 inches in the Summit Lake area. Ridgetop winds averaged 20-30mph out of the east with gusts to 44mph. |
| Friday, March 26th 2010 | SKIER-TRIGGERED AVALANCHES
- North face of Sunburst near the top of Elevator Shaft. The skier triggered it on his third jump turn from the top. It broke 2-3 feet deep and ran 1000 feet.
-South face of A1 in the Upper Girdwood Valley between 4000 and 5000 feet. No information reported on this slide. |
| Thursday, March 25th 2010 | SKIER-TRIGGERED AVALANCHES
-North aspect of Granddaddy Chute (Bertha Creek drainage), 2.5 feet deep, 150-200 feet wide.
-Taylor Pass between Sunburst and Magnum, windloaded north aspect, triggered while skinning, 3400 feet elevation, 80-90 feet wide, 1.5-2 feet deep, ran 300 feet on layer of buried surface hoar.
-South face of Sunburst at highest point, triggered while skiing on convex rollover, 6-9 inch deep crown face, ran 3/4 of the way to the bottom, happened at 12:30pm. |
| Wednesday, March 24th 2010 | Parking Lots Snow Stake Measurements:
Eddies Lot: 7" new
Motorized Lot: 7" new
Sunburst Lot: 6" new
Johnson Pass North Lot: 4" new |
| Saturday, March 20th 2010 | GLIDE CRACK AVALANCHE
A glide crack on the southern aspect of Tincan to the lookers left of Tincan Proper naturally avalanched either Friday 3/19 or Saturday 3/20 (see photo gallery) |
| Friday, March 19th 2010 | NATURAL AVALANCHES
Numerous Class 1 to 2.5 natural avalanches happened today after Thursday’s storm dumped 12-18 inches of new snow in Turnagain Pass. Most were small to medium sized slab avalanches on south and west aspects that were triggered by falling cornice chunks or wet sluffs. The biggest one was on the west facing headwall of Eddies. The crown face was 1 to 7 feet deep and 450 feet wide, and the failure layer was the new snow/old snow interface (no crust). Thursday’s snow fell on a one inch thick sun crust that formed March 15-17 on south through southwest aspects. A layer of surface hoar also formed March 15-17 on all aspects up to the ridgetops. |
| Friday, March 19th 2010 | Parking Lots Snow Stake Measurements:
Eddies Lot: 9" new
Motorized Lot: 15" new
Sunburst Lot: 9" new
Johnson Pass North Lot: 3" new |
| Wednesday, March 17th 2010 | NATURAL AVALANCHES
Widespread loose snow point release avalanches on sunny S, SE, and SW aspect slopes observed 3/15-3/17. Several slab avalanches triggered by loose snow avalanches, and some spontaneous slab avalanches observed as well. |
| Wednesday, March 17th 2010 | SKIER TRIGGERED AVALANCHES:
Three skier triggered avalanches reported from yesterday. One near Granite Creek across from Johnson North Trailhead, one on Big League (behind Alyeska), and one near Grandview. Details are limited but one involved a full burial (the skier was able to self rescue after being buried very shallow). No reported injuries. One common theme seems to be shallow snow trigger points then propagation into deeper snow. These slides have been from 1 to 6 feet deep. Failure has occurred on an old snow new snow interface and associated crusts with facets. Most have been late in the afternoon when the suns short wave warming effect has affected the snows stability. |
| Tuesday, March 16th 2010 | HUMAN-TRIGGERED AVALANCHE
A skier skinning up triggered and avalanche a few hundred feet wide that ranged in depth from 1'-4'. It failed on top of a recent sun crust (potentially with facets on top of the crust) on a South East aspect at about 2:20pm on Tuesday 3/16/2010. No injuries or burial reported. The location was the southern end of Turnagain Pass on the corner accros the highway from Pete's Creek and the Johnson Pass North Trailhead. |
| Monday, March 15th 2010 | HUMAN-TRIGGERED AVALANCHE
Reported at 3600’ on the west side of the Seward Highway across from Lower Summit Lake yesterday. Estimates from the reporting party describe the avalanche as 300’ wide, 1’ deep, which ran 2000’ and sympathetically triggered another avalanche 150’ wide. The bed surface/failure layer was a recent crust. The slope angle at the trigger point was estimated to be 35 degrees on shallow rocky terrain that was slightly wind loaded. The snowboarder that triggered the avalanche started to get partially buried on the way down, but luckily was spit out on top of the debris at the bottom. No injuries reported.
|
| Monday, March 15th 2010 | Parking Lot Snow Steak Measurements
Eddies Lot: 3"
Motorized Lot: 3"
Sunburst Lot: 2"
Johnson Pass North: 1" |
| Sunday, March 14th 2010 | Parking Lot Snowstake Measurements:
Eddies: 6" new
Motorized Lot: 4" new
Sunburst Lot: 4" new
Johnson Pass North Lot: 3" new |
| Thursday, March 11th 2010 | HUMAN-TRIGGERED AVALANCHE
Large skier-triggered avalanche on south face of Cornbiscuit. Triggered while skinning near ridge. 300-500 ft wide, 1-6 ft deep, ran full slope and 100 ft up the north side of Lipps. Slope had already been skied 10 times. Bed surface was a thin crust with facets underneath. |
| Tuesday, March 9th 2010 | Parking Lot Snowstake Measurements:
Eddies: 9" new
Motorized Lot: 9" new
Sunburst Lot: 7" new
Johnson Pass North Lot: 19" storm total *we were unable to check this stake on 3/8 |
| Monday, March 8th 2010 | Parking Lot Snow Stake Measurements:
Eddies Lot: 22" new
Motorized Lot: 22" new
Sunburst: 15" new
Johnson Pass North Trailhead: unable to access parking lot
Ingram Creek: 11" new mixed with some rain
Placer Main/Overflow: 12-16" new mixed with some rain
20 Mile: 14" new mixed with some rain |
| Saturday, March 6th 2010 | Parking Lot Snow Stake Measurements (48 hour):
Eddies Lot: 12" new snow
Motorized Lot: 17" new snow
Sunburst Lot: 7" new snow
Johnson Pass North: 8" new snow |
| Friday, March 5th 2010 | Three day snow fall totals as of 03-04-2010:
Eddies-20"
Turnagain Motorized lot - 24"
Sunburst - 18"
Johnson - 16"
Lost Lake TH - 10" Lost Lake Trail is improving but still needs more snow cover before it can handle lots of snowmachine use.
Divide - 16"
Primrose - 10"
Moose Pass area - 8"
Summit - 6"
Cooper Landing - 4" |
| Wednesday, March 3rd 2010 | Parking Lot Snow Stake Measurements:
Eddies Lot: 13"
Motorized Lot: 14"
Sunburst: 6"
Johnson Pass North Trailhead: 6" |
| Tuesday, March 2nd 2010 | Parking Lot Snow Stake Measurements:
Eddies Lot: 3"
Motorized Lot: 4"
Sunburst Lot: 2"
Johnson Pass North Trailhead: trace |
| Sunday, February 28th 2010 | Parking Lot Snow Stake Measurements (24 hour):
Eddies Lot: 11" new snow
Motorized Lot: 5" new snow
Sunburst Lot: 3" new snow
Johnson Pass North: 3" new snow |
| Friday, February 26th 2010 | 5-7" of new light density snow, limited wind, temps in teens to low 20's
- soft slabs present |
| Sunday, February 21st 2010 | In the last two weeks Turnagain Pass received 7.5 feet of snow and over 9 inches of water, with consistent rain below 1000 feet from Feb 10-19. Gale to storm force easterly winds pummeled us the last three days of the storm. The storm peaked on Feb. 18 along with the natural avalanche cycle. Many large natural avalanches occurred on all aspects and elevations. |
| Friday, February 19th 2010 | Rain line pushed to 3000 ft. 3-5 inches of water this week and 5 plus feet of snow above a fluctuating snowline.
|
| Thursday, February 18th 2010 | 24 hour snow accumulations:
Johnson -1.5"
Sunburst - 1"
Motorized - 8"
Eddies - 8" |
| Monday, February 15th 2010 | 17 inches of new snow and 2 inches of water in the last 24 hours. Rain below 1000 feet and gale force easterly winds. |
| Saturday, February 13th 2010 | SNOWMACHINER FATALITY
-A snowmachiner triggered a large avalanche on the west ridge of Grandview at approximately mile 43 of the railroad tracks between Portage and Moose Pass. Two riders were caught and buried, one was killed, and one is still missing. The avalanche possibly failed on a surface hoar/crust combo.
-4 feet of new snow and 4 inches of water in the last 8 days
-Numerous medium to large natural avalanches on Friday Feb. 12 failed on buried surface hoar layers.
|
| Friday, February 12th 2010 | Parking Lot Snow Stake Measurements (24 hour):
Eddies Lot: 6" new snow
Motorized Lot: 8" new snow
Sunburst Lot: 2" new snow
Johnson Pass North: trace of new snow |
| Wednesday, February 10th 2010 | Parking Lot Snow Stake Measurements (24 hour):
Eddies Lot: 3" new snow
Motorized Lot: 2.5" new snow
Sunburst Lot: .5" new snow
Johnson Pass North: trace of new snow |
| Tuesday, February 9th 2010 | Parking Lot Snow Stake Measurements (24 hour):
Eddies Lot: 3" new snow
Motorized Lot: 3" new snow
Sunburst Lot: 1" new snow
Johnson Pass North: 2" new snow |
| Monday, February 8th 2010 | Parking Lot Snow Stake Measurements taken at (24 hour):
Eddies Lot: 3" new snow
Motorized Lot: 2.5" new snow
Sunburst Lot: 1" new snow
Johnson Pass North: 1" new snow
|
| Sunday, February 7th 2010 | **OUTSIDE ADVISORY AREA**
-Skier-triggered avalanche South Fork Eagle River at 3500 feet on a run locally known as "Leighow". Triggered near a shallower spot in the snowpack near a rock band, most likely recently wind loaded. It ran for 1800 feet down the chute. |
| Sunday, February 7th 2010 | Parking Lot Snow Stake Measurements (2/5 to 2/7):
Eddies Lot: 13" new snow
Motorized Lot: 10" new snow
Sunburst Lot: 8" new snow
Johnson Pass North: 6" new snow |
| Saturday, February 6th 2010 | SKIER-TRIGGERED AVALANCHE
-13 inches of new snow/1 inch water along with moderate to gale force easterly winds in the last 36 hours.
-A skier triggered an avalanche on a southwest aspect of Tincan at 3000 feet in an area called the Kitchen Wall. The skier was caught, carried, and partially buried but able to dig himself out. We estimated the slide at 150 feet wide, 200 feet long, 14 inches deep at the crown face, and 39 degrees at the trigger point. The slide failed below a recently formed windslab on a very small layer of buried surface hoar on top of a 1mm thick melt-freeeze crust.
-Numerous shooting cracks on steep rollovers breaking down about a foot deep. Recently formed windslabs (2-6 inches thick) were especially reactive, fracturing 25-60 feet wide on leeward slopes. |
| Tuesday, February 2nd 2010 | SNOWMACHINE-TRIGGERED AVALANCHE
Observed on Tuesday Feb 2. We are not sure exactly when it was triggered, but it looked recent. See photo gallery. |
| Friday, January 29th 2010 | Skier triggered avalanches on the west face of Superbowl Peak and the south side of Cornbiscuit. They measured 10 inches deep, 45-60 ft wide and ran 500 to 900 ft. Failure most likely occurred on the old snow, new snow interface where buried surface hoar is present up to 3500ft. |
| Wednesday, January 27th 2010 | Parking Lot Snow Stake Measurements:
Eddies Lot: 1" new snow
Motorized Lot: 1" new snow
Sunburst Lot: 1" new snow
Johnson Pass North: 1" new snow |
| Monday, January 25th 2010 | Sunny skies, light winds, and mountain temps in the 20's the last 5 days. Only a few isolated pockets of instability reported in addition to sluffing on 40+ degree terrain:
1/21: Small skier-triggered soft slab 1 ft. deep on Cornbiscuit
1/23: Skier-triggered soft slab on the west face of Magnum at 2500 feet. This slide was estimated at 30-50 feet wide, 1 ft. deep, and 150 feet long.
1/24: Loud whumph reported in the trees below 1500 feet north of Tincan.
|
| Tuesday, January 19th 2010 | Parking Lot Snow Stake Measurements:
Eddies Lot: 2" new snow
Motorized Lot: 2" new snow
Sunburst Lot: 2" new snow
Johnson Pass North: 1" new snow |
| Sunday, January 17th 2010 | Parking Lot Snow Stake Totals (Last measurement was on Wednesday 1/13/10):
Eddies Lot: 18" new
Motorized Lot: 17" new
Sunburst: 8" new
Johnson Pass North: 6" new |
| Saturday, January 16th 2010 | Numerous soft slab avalanches running on the crust layer with whumphing at the lower elevations:
-Big soft slabs releasing on steep rollovers on Tincan.
-Ski cuts in the upper elevations of the Girdwood Valley produced 4-6 inch thick soft slabs propagating down the walls of a steep chute. |
| Thursday, January 14th 2010 | Skier Triggered avalanche on west aspect, 3800 ft, Pastoral Peak, Turnagain Pass. Steep chute with a 1.5 ft deep crown face, wall to wall, ran 900 feet, SS-AS-2-O . The bed surface was the crust layer. |
| Wednesday, January 13th 2010 | Parking Lot Snow Stake Measurements 1/13/2010
Eddies Lot:3.5 inches new snow
Motorized Lot:2.5 inches new snow
Sunburst Lot:2 inches new snow
Johnson Pass North Lot:1 inch new snow |
| Tuesday, January 12th 2010 | Parking Lot Snow Stake Measurements 1/12/2010
Eddies Lot:7 inches new snow
Motorized Lot:6 inches new snow
Sunburst Lot:5 inches new snow
Johnson Pass North Lot:3 inches new snow |
| Thursday, January 7th 2010 | Rain to 2800-3000 feet today with strong easterly winds. A few small point release wet slides observed. |
| Tuesday, January 5th 2010 | Glide Crack Avalanche Observed (see photo gallery)
We are not exactly sure when this glide crack failed, but it probably avalanched sometime on Monday Jan 4, 2010. |
| Monday, December 28th 2009 | Warm temps, strong easterly winds, and rain below 2000 feet December 21-27. Snowfall & water totals for Center Ridge Wx station 12/21-12/27: 25" snow, 3.5" SWE
|
| Thursday, December 24th 2009 | MANY NATURAL AND HUMAN TRIGGERED AVALANCHE RECORDED
Most of the avalanche activity occurred on 24 hour old snow, 6-8 inches deep.
24 hours: 5-14 inches of snow fell in Girdwood, 10 inches in Turnagain Pass, and 4 inches in Summit Lake. Approximate 3 day storm totals for Girdwood 15-28 inches, Turnagain Pass 20 inches, and Summit Lake 9 inches. These amounts are above the snowline. The snowline has fluctuated from sea level to 1200 ft. Almost all precip has been rain from sea level to 800 feet. |
| Saturday, December 19th 2009 | SKIER TRIGGERED AVALANCHE
-A skier triggered a small avalanche between 2500 and 3000 feet elevation on Tincan on a slope below the main bowl. This slide was 1.5 feet deep, 20 feet wide, and ran 30 feet long.
-40 to 50 ft. long shooting cracks were reported at 3000 feet elevation on Manitoba. The wind was actively loading the slope at the time, and the cracks went down 2 feet to the new snow/old snow interface. |
| Thursday, December 17th 2009 | Snow stake totals:
Eddies Lot: 5" new
Motorized Lot: 4" new
Sunburst Lot: 3" new
Johnson Pass North Lot: 4" new |
| Wednesday, December 16th 2009 | Parking Lot Snow Measurements:
Eddies Lot: 4" new
Motorized Lot: 4" new
Sunburst Lot: 4" new
Johnson North Lot: 3" new |
| Tuesday, December 15th 2009 | Parking Lot Snow Measurements:
Eddies Lot: 3" new
Motorized Lot: 4" new
Sunburst Lot: 5"
Johnson Pass North: 4" |
| Sunday, December 13th 2009 | No new snow in the last 12 days. We had a strong inversion for 7 days from Dec 6-12 with fog down low and above freezing temps at the higher elevations. The warmest temps occurred Dec 7-9 with readings in the mid to upper 40's above 3000 feet elevation. Winds were light and variable during the inversion. |
| Thursday, December 3rd 2009 | NATURAL AVALANCHES
Medium sized Class 2 Natural Avalanches were observed on Tincan (see Photo Gallery). Large Class 3 natural avalanches observed on the south and west aspects of Sunburst and Magnum. Most of these failed on the facets on the ground during the height of the storm on Tuesday 12/1/2009. |
| Wednesday, December 2nd 2009 | Parking Lot Snow Measurements for Tuesday 12/1/09:
Tincan Lot: 24-28 inches of new wet snow
Motorized Lot: 22 inches of new snow
Sunburst Lot: 10 inches of new very wet snow
Johnson Pass Trailhead: 5 inches of new very wet snow |
| Sunday, November 29th 2009 | Parking lot storm snow totals since Monday 11/23/09
Eddies Lot: 27" new snow
Motorized Lot: 31" new snow
Sunburst Lot: 20" new snow
Johnson Pass Trailhead: 14" new snow |
| Saturday, November 28th 2009 | 2 feet of snow has fallen in the last 24 hours in many areas covered by this advisory. Most of that fell yesterday. 4 to 6 inches fell last night. 2 to 3 inches of water equivalent fell in this storm. Snowfall totals for the two day storm range from 1 to 2 feet at sea level and 3 to 4 feet above 500 ft. |
| Monday, November 23rd 2009 | Eddies Parking Lot: 12" new wet snow (rain/snow mix)
Motorized Parking Lot: 24" new snow
Sunburst Parking Lot: 16" new snow (rain/snow mix)
Johnson Pass Trailhead: 3" new snow
Natural avalanches and human/triggered avalanches observed in Girdwood Valley and Turnagain Pass.
|
| Thursday, November 12th 2009 | Nov. 12, 2009 - 4-6 inches of new snow yesterday over the advisory area. Center Ridge station at 1000 ft in Turanagain Pass is reporting 19 inches total snowpack. Expect to see 9-10 inches at the highway elevation of 1000 ft in T. Pass. The first report of a snowboard triggered avalanche came in today. A rider lost his board yesterday at Flattop. No further details. Although outside our advisory area this reminds us that winter and avalanche season has arrived. |
| Tuesday, November 10th 2009 | Nov. 10, 2009 - 4-6 inches at 1000ft, 14-15 inches at tree line, 0-30 inches in the alpine due to wind erosion or deposition. |
| Monday, October 12th 2009 | Oct. 12, 2009 - Very warm start to October. Snow line back to 4000 ft. Most ridgetop snow has melted back in the advisory area. Valley temps in the 50's. An ENSO (El Nino Southern Oscillation ) pattern is forecasted for the 09-10 season. This is subject to debate but usually means warmer, drier temps for us in general. Although remember 1998-99 (~1000in). |
| Thursday, September 24th 2009 | Sept. 24, 2009 - First measurable snowfall at higher elevations. Snow continued through Oct. 25. Approx. 3-4 inches with up to a foot in the Upper Glacier Creek drainages. Snow line approx. 2000 ft. |
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