Eddies | Chugach Avalanche Center

Avalanche Details

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Trigger	Natural	Remote Trigger	Unknown
Avalanche Type	Glide	Aspect	South
Elevation	2300ft	Slope Angle	unknown
Crown Depth	unknown	Width	unknown
Vertical Run	unknown

Red Flags

Red flags are simple visual clues that are a sign of potential avalanche danger. Please record any sign of red flags below.

Obvious signs of instability

Recent Avalanches?	Yes
Collapsing (Whumphing)?	No
Cracking (Shooting cracks)?	No

Observer Comments

Recent glide avalanche on Eddies and additional cracks, lots of glide cracks on Seattle Ridge
Slab avalanches on Wolverine that looks to have occurred during yesterday's storm and recent cornice falls on both Wolverine ridgelines.
Active wind loading throughout the day
Localized cracking in wind loaded terrain

Weather & Snow Characteristics

Please provide details to help us determine the weather and snowpack during the time this observation took place.

Weather

Overcast becoming broken in the late afternoon
Moderate south winds gusty at times - blowing snow. W/NW on Sunburst and Seattle Ridge wx station. This is typical pattern, NW winds get pushed through Turnagain from the south. The ridge to each side of the Eddies headwall shows the prevailing NE wind loading and then the wind southerly wind loading from today note the opposing cornice and wind lip.
Temperatures in the mid 20°Fs

Snow surface

From 400' at parking lot to around 800' in meadows/clearings the a crust was supportable, in the woods it's a mixture of supportable or punchy, "sporty conditions".
Around 800' crust becomes breakable up to around 1750'. Runnels...
From 1750 - 2550' wind crust of varied thickness. Did manage to find a few inches of soft snow in protected terrain.
Wind was actively moving snow throughout the day filling in the skin track and texturing the surface.

Snowpack

We dug @ 1680'. N aspect, 25° slope, HS: 420cm, at the surface 5 cm new snow over a 5 cm melt-freeze crust. New/old interface was 25 cm down, CT 12 x3, ECTN 12. 1.17 melt-freeze crust 85 cm down and 10 cm thick but no results in stability tests at interface above or below. No faceting noted.

We dug @ 1850'. NW aspect, 24° slope, HS, 410 cm, surface was a 10 cm wind crust, new/old interface 30 cm down CT 15, CT 12, ECTN 15. 1.17 melt-freeze crust 90 cm down. It was a small (5 cm) crust sandwich with grains starting to facet in the middle, CT 25, CT 26, failing in the middle of the crust, ECTX.

Photos & Video

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