Solitude Ridge

Posted April 29th, 2010 by joshf

Location

United States
37° 35' 49.056" N, 118° 57' 5.7312" W
Date and time of observation: 
April 29, 2010 - 10:45am
Region: 
Mammoth Area
Observation Type: 
Snowpack
Avalanche
Route: 

Sherwin creek road, over shoulder of Punta Bardini, up Solitude Canyon and up to northern end of solitude ridge.  Down Banana chute, back up, down main wide gully, up to Punta Bardini, down skier right chute and back to car.

Red Flags: 
Recent loading by new snow, wind, or rain
Obvious avalanche path
Weather Observations
Blowing Snow: 
No
Wind Speed: 
Calm
Wind Direction: 
Northeast
Air temperature: 
Below Freezing
Air temperature trend: 
Warming
Cloud Cover: 
0.25
Precipitation: 
None
Accumulation rate: 
None
More detailed information about the weather: 

Blue bird morning, calm winds, chilly temps in teens lower 20s.  Some clouds moved in mid morning, some short periods of very light flurries, light winds out of the Northeast.

Avalanche Observations
Avalanche Type: 
Dry
Avalanche Type: 
Slab
Trigger type: 
Skier
Slope: 
42degrees
Aspect: 
North
Elevation: 
10450ft.
Bed Surface: 
Storm Snow
Weak Layer: 
Storm Snow
Crown Height: 
Less than 1 ft
Avalanche Width: 
100ft.
Avalanche Length: 
1500ft.
Number of people caught: 
0
Number of partial burials: 
0
Number of full burials: 
0
More detailed information about the avalanche: 

Ski cut top convexity of banana chute, 10" crown, 100' wide, ran 1500', encompassing most of chute.  Fist+ soft slab running within storm snow on 4finger+ bed surface.  
   Test pit in remaining snow above crown:
       -CT2Q1 25cm down X 2  at interface avalanche slid on.
       -ECTP12Q1 35cm down  This failure occured just below 1cm pencil hard
                                          melt freeze crust which was the old snow surface.
                                          When this failed, the upper layer
                                          25cm down failed and propogated as well.    
 After this test pit, continued ski cutting ridge top on edges of chute with similar depth failures.  Discussed deeper ECT failure, and since most of the load ontop had slid decided to ski slope one at a time. 
Hiked back up, ski cut top of main wide bowl with similar smaller results on steeper convex portion.  Traversed to less steep entrance and skied main wide chute with no further results. 

On 2nd lap wide bowl to skier's left of banana chute, smaller releases on ski cuts on convexities just below ridge. 

Avalanche/Snowpack Photos: 
Comments: 

~10 inch soft slabs wide spread where wind had deposited snow on north facing steep convex rolls just below ridges.  Both main chutes on Punta Bardini had stable snow.  These chutes are more protected from the wind (they start lower down slope as oposed to Solitude chutes which start right off of end of ridge).  Ski cuts produced no results.  Excellent wintery powder ontop of soft smooth underlying surface, for both bardini chutes and solitude.  Good snow out there, but not all stable.  Pay special attention to steeper convex rolls, generally north facing below ridges, especially at elevations above 10,000'.     

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Rode two laps on the Sherwins

Submitted by GT93546 on April 29, 2010 - 9:24pm.

Rode two laps on the Sherwins today. No instabilities noticed with ski cuts. Snow was really, really good as I'm sure you noticed on your laps. Heading out to the crest tomorrow, Blue Crag or the prow depending on how thing are looking. Those ten inch slabs on Solitude have my guard up for sure. Cold temps tonight should help though.