Northern Gallatin

From obs 2/6/21: "Natural slide below Maid of the Mist (unless someone was up climbing Maid No More...). E/NE aspect, roughly 8000' elevation. Looked to have run last night or early this morning. Poor resolution iphone photo, but gets the job done. Photo taken from the base of the Dribbles." Photo: M. Zia

From obs: "Skied up into Divide Basin today... Observed 2 natural avalanches on the N face of the cirque, one quite large.... Shortly after digging the pit, on the same slope 30’ above it we triggered a slab that cracked but did not move..." Photo: J. Dalimata

Froma skier that tooured in divide cirque today. "In the basin, between pt 10,201 and 10,024 there was a very large avalanche that must have slid yesterday or last night. It looks like it propagated at least 1000’ wide and at the deepest the crown was easily 5 feet. Visibility was low so it was hard to tell, but it was definitely a big slide." Photo: N. Salsburg

Natural slide below Maid of the Mist (unless someone was up climbing Maid No More...). E/NE aspect, roughly 8000' elevation.

Looked to have run last night or early this morning. Poor resolution iphone photo, but gets the job done. Photo taken from the base of the Dribbles.

Skied up into Divide Basin today and holy shit there is so much snow! 3’ of new on top of a crust that is present on S faces and not present elsewhere that we found. Observed 2 natural avalanches on the N face of the cirque, one quite large. There is a picture of those. Also observed another natural avalanche on the SE face of the cirque that I was unable to get a good photograph because of clouds. We dug 2 pits and got an ECTX on both (one at 9300’ - 270 cm of snow, one at 9500’- over 300 cm of snow) on S/SE facing slopes less than 20 degrees. The one at 9500’ we had a hard time sawing through the hard crust that is under 3’ of new snow so it probably isn’t very accurate. Shortly after digging the pit, on the same slope 30’ above it we triggered a slab that cracked but did not move. Turned around right there and left. A good example of how feedback from pits is not necessarily the end all be all. I think the new snow will become more reactive as it settles into a more cohesive slab. We kept it overly conservative and I just want to say I appreciate you all!!!

Toured in divide cirque today. There was about 24” of fresh snow which made trail breaking very difficult. I did a quick pit and found a fist hard slab sandwiched between two layers of very low density snow. My guess is this layer formed when the cold front passed last night. I stuck to low angle terrain. In the basin, between pt 10,201 and 10,024 there was a very large avalanche that must have slid yesterday or last night. It looks like it propagated at least 1000’ wide and at the deepest the crown was easily 5 feet. Visibility was low so it was hard to tell, but it was definitely a big slide. Light snow in the AM became moderate in the afternoon, and it began accumulating rapidly.

Skied off the shoulder of Blackmore today. No recent avalanche activity was evident, not even sloughs down the face. New snow was right side up and well bonded. Was still seeing propagation in pits in the low to mid 20s range though. Generally breaking on a layer of faceted snow sitting below a melt freeze crust about 2ft down.