Since our last storm and avalanche cycle the snowpack over the last few weeks has significantly stabilized although the avalanche danger has not completely disappeared. With that in mind, with my touring partner, Becca Roseberry, we traveled to the head of Mosquito Creek with the goal of finding some “wild snow”. Or rather snow that has had little or no skier traffic.

By finding some wild snow our goal was two fold. First, by finding snow in as close to a natural state as possible I thought we would have an better chance of locating the forecasted instability that still lurks in the snowpack and thus, dig a test pit to find it. Second, while obvious yet worth mention, ski untracked powder.

Upon our approach we had a great profile view of our intended ridge of ski decent. This allowed us to sight in the slope angle from a safe distance and confirm that we would be skiing a 25 degree slope. In other words, a slope angle that is at the very beginnings of the range of avalanche terrain.  As I mentioned earlier our goal was to ski untracked powder and honestly, after being at sea level on vacation for the past two weeks my legs needed the acclimatization anyhow!

This area provided us with consistently light, creamy, boot top powder and great turns despite its relatively low slope angle. After our first lap, I somehow mustered up the discipline to dig a pit. While I expected to find some instability I was caught by surprise at how delicate the snowpack really was.

I started by conducting two Compression Tests (CT) with consistent yet unremarkable results of CT23 Q2/3 47cm down from the surface. These results began to give me some confidence that the snowpack was stabilizing. Although in the back of my mind I could hear the avalanche practitioners mantra, “if you suspect instability and don’t find it, keep digging!” I then followed up with an Extended Column Test (ECT). The results here were rather dramatic with results of a ECT23 Q1 full propagation.

The take home message here is that full propagation results found in an ECT have a high correlation with avalanches. The main reason we were not seeing avalanches here was because of the low slope angle. Based on the ECT results, had this snowpack been in steeper terrain, and we were skiing it, there would have been a high probability of triggering an avalanche.

Terrain selection is your best tool for avoiding avalanches. Our decision to ski this area was based on the fact that we would be able to find low angle terrain outside of the range you would expect avalanches to occur. This decision kept us safe from the lurking instability that we found in this area. The test results also suggested that the tempting, steeper, untracked avalanche paths in this area were off limits as a terrain choice and were potentially death traps!

Below you will find a graphic representation of the pit we dug and the video below says it all, except were I misspoke in regards to the elevation. We were actually at an elevation of 8,500’ as opposed to the guesstimate of 7,800’ I suggested in the video.

Remember, keep it safe out there and remember check the daily bulletin from the Bridger Teton National Forest Avalanche Center before you go!