ACMG Mountain Conditions Report Archive: January 2006

Tuesday, January 31, 2006

[MCR] Purple Bowl con't

In addition to my last post regarding Purple Bowl, in case it wasn't clear,
Purple Bowl is a very dangerous place right now, as is any complex ski
terrain in the area, and is best avoided until the danger decreases.

Regards,
Tom Wolfe

_______________________________________________
These observations and opinions are those of the person who submitted them. The ACMG and its members take no responsibility for errors, omissions, or lapses in continuity. Conditions differ greatly over time and space due to the variable nature of mountain weather and terrain. Application of this information provides no guarantee of increased safety. Do not use the Mountain Conditions Report as the sole factor in planning trips or making decisions in the field.
Please check out http://acmg.ca/mcr for more information.

[MCR] Purple Bowl/Wolverine Ridge

Joshua Levigne and I snuck our way up to the top of Purple Bowl today via
Lipalian Pk's N ridge & summit (not exactly recommended but good fun). We
skied out via Wolverine Ridge. Ski quality ranged from excellent to
downright weird.

SNOWPACK: HS at TL is about 80 cm. In the alpine, 15-20 cm of low density
storm snow on top of a 15 cm 1F storm snow wind slab (from last night's wind
event) on top of about 40 cm of 1F to 4F facets, on top of 3 cm of F 8-10 mm
depth hoar.

AVALANCHE ACTIVITY: Strangely, until we crested Wolverine Ridge we observed
little cracking and no whoomfing. This all changed 100 m along the ridge
with a most extraordinary whoooommmmmpfmmpf lasting several seconds and
resounding across the ridge, sympathetically releasing, 15 m away, a size
1.5 slab that ran to ground down to the bottom of the bowl to the south
(2400 m).

Moments later, 500 meters away and on the opposite side of Purple Bowl (NE,
2400 m), a sz 2.0 slab sympathetically released, also to ground.

Further along Wolverine Ridge we propogated another sympathetic slab from 70
m away, this time on the N side of Wolverine Ridge and running to the bottom
of Wolverine Bowl, sz 2.5.

Also observed was a natural size 3.0 on from near the summit of Lipalian,
less than 24 hrs old.

Failure layer in all cases was depth hoar, about 8-10 mm, at the ground, 3
cm thick.

I would rate Danger:
Alpine: High
TL - Considerable
BTL - Low

We ended up at Purple bowl because the roads W and N were closed due to
avalanche control -- apparently Bosworth slid to the road, hitting some
cars. No injuries.

Regards,
Tom Wolfe
Ass't Alpine Guide

Monday, January 30, 2006

[MCR] Evan Thomas

Snowline was very wet, with easy swinging. Moonlight has a wet-ish
streak down the middle, but either side is dry. The ice currently
fractures and dinner plates easily where dry. 2 Low For Zero appeared
to be in good shape, and another party reported good protection on it
as well. Snowing all day, with 5-10 cm, of new snow covering the tracks
in.

Aaron Beardmore
Mountain Guide

www.alpineview.ca
info@alpineview.ca

[MCR] Cascade

No new snow on the approach, and slippery! Somewhat sun affected throughout the climb, and made for easy swinging. Temperature was cool all day, no warmer than -3. It was a little hollow sounding only at the very last bulge, and could see some water running behind. You can climb around easily to the left. You can see it in the photo as the grey spot at the very top.

As for the bowl above, there isn't to much snow to speak of as of today. There was some old debris about 200m above the last pitch, from who knows when?

Also,the first chain anchor on the left has been damaged by rockfall/avalanches. You can belay easily on the ice just to the right.

Aaron Beardmore

Mountain Guide
www.alpineview.ca

Sunday, January 29, 2006

[MCR] Crowfoot Glades & Simpsons Pass

Saturday, January 28: Crowfoot Glades
A great day skiing in the glades. On average around –10 at treeline with moderate gusting strong winds out of the S-SW. Anything in the open had that funky feeling wind slab, the sort that you can’t trust. I was definitely thinking about propagations but heard no settlements all day. We stuck to the treeline terrain and skied far skiers left on the old bed surfaces of a huge cycle that ripped through the area sometime ago. Excellent skiing in the steeps, just had to watch out of the odd nasty chunk of debris in the flat light. We also skied one of the steep chutes off the front back into the marsh, it all slid during the last cycle and offered great skiing again.

Considerable at treeline and Moderate below treeline. Cirque and Observation looked absolutely wind blasted.

Sunday, January 29: Healy-Simpsons-Sunshine Circuit
I can’t add too much to Grant’s report, except for the thundering whumfing and shooting cracks in the meadows above Simpson’s Pass on the way to Wawa Ridge. Definitely very low confidence on any feature. Skiing through very low angled terrain we caused a whumpf that traveled a few meters to a 25 degree slope, you could hear the settlement travel quite a distance (>100m). The slope fully cracked and wanted to move, just lacked the incline. Below treeline was a very different feeling with quite a strong mid-pack compared to treeline, punching track up from Simpson’s Pass was quite straight forward and while we didn’t find the most elegant way through the cliff bands stability wasn’t on my mind too much, although I didn’t test my theory too much either.

We were at the top of Wawa around 4pm and it was blowing like crazy and starting to snow. The clouds to the west looked like they were bringing some good precip, lets hope so!

Considerable in the alpine and treeline, Moderate below treeline.

Ian Tomm

[MCR] Sunshine Villag area

Last 3 days in the backcountry around Sunshine Village.

Temps around -10, wind SW and moving 10 cm of recent snow around. In
sheltered areas the skiing is fantastic with 10-25 cm low density snow on
the surface.

Above TL feels spooky - the recent snow has been blown into soft slabs and
one could probably trigger a 20-40 cm windslab easily in steep, wind
affected pockets near ridge crests.

The deeper snowpack remains a concern with many settlements and cracks
shooting all over the place. Lots of variation in snowpack depth makes it
seem quite unpredictable, sheltered areas at treeline have more uniform
depth and felt better.

Good visibility today and we observed no natural avalanches but got
settlements on every slope we touched, so something is lurking.

Grant Statham
Mountain Guide

Monday, January 23, 2006

[MCR] Hudson Bay Mountain 23 Jan 06

A day of much precipitation and wind. The wind is strong from the south
in the alpine, but light just below 1600 m. About 15 cm of snow fell at
the ski hill in the last 24 hours. Temperatures were -4 at 1600 m.

We felt several medium sized whumpfs and cornices broke about 40 cm
thick when kicked. Again, we saw no avalanche activity on the Kathlyn
Face or in Simpson's Gulch, but the visibility was poor.

On 21 January, there was a skier involvement in Little Simpson's Gulch.
I spoke to one of the party today. They skied at about 1700 m on a SE
aspect near a rock. The first skier was about three turns into a 35
degree slope when he heard his partner yell. He was able to ski out.
They describe the avalanche as a hard slab up to 1 m thick and 150 m
wide. It ran 200 m. They say that after the release, the rock showed
much larger. It appears that they hit a shallow spot. It does not appear
that it stepped down into the deep instabilities. The sizes sound a bit
big to me, but it must have been scary.

We dug a pit near Little Simpson's in a still wind affected spot. There
were 173 cm of snow. The surface hoar is 80 cm down and does not react
consistently. There are several shears that compress progressively in
the storm snow. There is a hard consistent shear below a crust 120 cm
down. We also found a very thin rain crust at the surface in places - it
may have rained to TL for a bit yesterday.
--
Christoph Dietzfelbinger
Mountain Guide, Bear Mountaineering and Burnie Glacier Chalet
Box 4222
Smithers, B.C. V0J 2N0 Canada
tel. 250-847-3351 fax: 250-847-2854
info@bearmountaineering.ca www.bearmountaineering.ca
_______________________________________________
These observations and opinions are those of the person who submitted them. The ACMG and its members take no responsibility for errors, omissions, or lapses in continuity. Conditions differ greatly over time and space due to the variable nature of mountain weather and terrain. Application of this information provides no guarantee of increased safety. Do not use the Mountain Conditions Report as the sole factor in planning trips or making decisions in the field.
Please check out http://acmg.ca/mcr for more information.

Saturday, January 21, 2006

[MCR] Ice and safety

As a public service reminder i thought this to be an adequate forum to get
my message across.

Here was the scenario, Awesome early morning (too early for the location)
but felt like getting some climbs in before the the first climbers got to
the area (Evan Thomas Creek). The morning was awesome good coffee awesome
moonlight spirit was high.
Got to the base of the route feeling good. After my first route confidence
was strong. By headlamp i enjoyed completing my second route before the
light was good enough to illuminate my second rappel. The ice had been
variable but good, a bit brittle in sections.

My first rap on the second route was relatively short i stopped at an
Abalakov, the routes all had multiple fixed stations of the sort, I set a
screw and clipped into both the screw and the "bomber" Abalakov. The knot
was out of the ice and the ice was totally free of any visible fractures.
After pulling my ropes through the anchor both ends were now on the ground.
For a moment i hesitated, the anchor looked good, no it looked really good
and i would be down in a short 30 seconds. However it could of been much
quicker getting down if i had not back up my sytem. But i had no real time
constraints or rush for safety i set a backup abalakov. I always back up
anchors of this sort, had i had a partner we would of back up with a screw
anchor. This time my system most likely saved my life. I leaned back and
within a second or so a block of ice with abalakov intact was accompanying
me on the rap. My anchor was set close to the initial Abalakov and the
shock was not really noticeable.

After hearing that folks use the Abalakov routinely in this popular area and
take them often as primary anchors i felt like i needed to say something.
Maybe it was the quick change in temperatures that might of forced the ice
to relieve some tension? Who knows, no visible or even location type flaws
in the abalakov were noticed. On my hike out the colours were really
bright, had a nice drive and enjoyed one of the best tasting coffees in my
life.

Patrick Delaney
ASS. Alpine guide

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[MCR] Howsons 20 Jan 06

Got to spend a day at the lodge yesterday. There are 155 cm of snow at
the lodge and more than 300 on the Solitaire Glacier. We saw evidence of
a widespread avalanche cycle very likely on the 16th of January. Many
windloaded features had slid to size 3. I suspect that nothing stepped
down to the deep instabilities. Currently, we only saw sluffs out of
steep terrain.

Skiing quality was excellent from top to bottom. The snow is very deep
below timberline. Above TL it is underlain by a firmer layer that makes
for easier trail breaking.

A snow profile at 1650 m in a scoured area showed 243 cm HS. The
raincrust is now 120 cm down. It produces fast and consistent shears in
the hard range. There are a few instabilities in the storm snow. We
could not find any surface hoar, but the site is very wind exposed.

The temperature was -11 at 2200 m, with light NE winds and some clouds
moving around.
--
Christoph Dietzfelbinger
Mountain Guide, Bear Mountaineering and Burnie Glacier Chalet
Box 4222
Smithers, B.C. V0J 2N0 Canada
tel. 250-847-3351 fax: 250-847-2854
info@bearmountaineering.ca www.bearmountaineering.ca
_______________________________________________
These observations and opinions are those of the person who submitted them. The ACMG and its members take no responsibility for errors, omissions, or lapses in continuity. Conditions differ greatly over time and space due to the variable nature of mountain weather and terrain. Application of this information provides no guarantee of increased safety. Do not use the Mountain Conditions Report as the sole factor in planning trips or making decisions in the field.
Please check out http://acmg.ca/mcr for more information.

[MCR] Callaghan Country Lodge, 25 Km west of Whistler.

I was working out of Callaghan Backcountry Lodge from the 16th to 19th. Lots of snow (77cm) accumulating throughout the week. At the lodge (4500') there was an HS of 325cm yesterday and at the 5200' study plot it is 4m. FP is about 1m everywhere. On the night of the 18/19 we received 35cm of light powder. The result was wide spread natural avalanching mid storm on only the new snow - all the usual indicator slopes fell. Yesterday's clear weather got us into the Alpine - ski cutting produced no results. Rated the Hazard as Considerable by yesterday afternoon. Excellent skiing quality.

Dave Sarkany, Ski Guide

Callaghan Country Lodge

[MCR] mica Mountain Valemount area

Just back from a few days of RAC in the Valemount area. Got to sled
up the old logging road from the mill on Blackman road, and up to
Cariboo Cat skiing's unload. We were basically on snowshoes, just
walked off the road a few feet...did see a couple of different aspects.
Along the road I stopped and did some probing and 3 quick pits.
there is about 110of snow at 4500ft, Ne facing.
The raincrust is down about 60-80cm.(see attach) Compression tests
here were easy to moderate!!! a "sudden collapse on the weak layers
near the rain crust.
Not as evident at treeline. We did see some older (1 week old ) slabs
on S aspects, cross loaded feature, ~ 70cm crown. Some newer activity
on the S side was also observed. A few small slabs were seen on the
NE aspects about 20cm down in the storm snow. could have been the
snowcat. Though harder compression were observed on both N and S
aspects at treeline, they were clean and repetitive.

Certainly worth paying attention now on all aspects. Not only is
there instability in the storm snow, but the deeper rain crust is
something we will all have to watch for a while to come...

Peter Amann
Mountain Guiding
Box 1495, Jasper AB, T0E 1E0
www.incentre.net/pamann
pamann@incentre.net

Thursday, January 19, 2006

[MCR] Rogers Pass

We've been in the Pass since Sunday on a guide training course. Groups have
been in the field on Monday (McGill Shoulder, McGill Pass, Grizzly Shoulder),
Wednesday (McGill Pass, Glacier Crest, Little Sifton) and Thursday
(Illecillewaet Glacier, Asulkan and Bonney Trees).

The week started with poor visibility, heavy snowfalls and an avalanche cycle
from the storm that has been affecting the Selkirks nearly continuously since
Christmas. Avalanches were up to size 3.5 and being triggered naturally, with
explosive control work and by skiers.

Snowpack depth at treeline is about 2 m. There is about 35 cm of low density
recent storm snow atop another 70 cm of well settled storm snow that has fallen
since Christmas. This all lies on a rain crust formed at Christmas and the
November crust near the ground. At the lower elevations we have been in there
are weaknesses within the upper part of the storm snow but that snow is so soft
that there is no slab. We haven't found instabilities around the Christmas or
November crusts.

We've been skiing below and at treeline and snow stability feels pretty good
there. It seems the large avalanche paths in the alpine are the concern due to
greater storm snow amounts and wind loading and weaker bonds at the deeply
buried crusts. Visibility was a bit better today and we could see into the
alpine. Natural avalanche activity has tapered off the last day or so and with
light winds at ridgetop and cool temps we felt OK about sneaking through the
runouts of the large avalanche paths. We still have low confidence with alpine
areas and any lower elevation areas threatened by large terrain above. There
were large avalanches triggered by large explosives to the west of the Rogers
Pass area today.

We started rating the avalanche danger at High in the alpine, High at treeline
and Considerable below treeline. Today we rated it Considerable, Moderate and
Low.

Mark Klassen
Dwayne Congdon
Colin Zacharias

Mountain Guides

[MCR] Black Prince Vicinity

I was in the Black Prince vicinity today, Jan. 19th, from 1800-2300m.

Trail breaking is good with 15 cm ski penetration. No whumpfs except at low elevation in a shallow snow pack area. A storm snow shear persists down 15cm but no activity was observed at this layer. Winds remained strong at ridgeline and snow was being deposited on lee slopes. Ski quality in sheltered areas was excellent.

Many fracture lines from last week's storm are visible. Some fractures occurred well down into treed slopes. Below treeline stability seemed good from my limited observations, but my instinct is to give the snow pack more time to settle before venturing onto steeper slopes.

Alison Andrews

Mountain Guide

[MCR] Prairie on Hudson Bay Mountain 19 Jan 06

Took a quick trip north of the ski hill boundary today. The flat prairie is
strongly wind affected. There was one large whumpf in flat terrain. I dug a
pit in a windloaded N aspect at 1650 m. The height of snow is from 160 to 210
cm in somewhat protected areas. The pit showed a fairly hard pack, with mostly
pencil hard snow and a few one finger layers in there. A buried surface hoar
layer is down 80 cm and reacts with sudden planar failures. A crust with
facets below is 110 cm down and reacts with sudden planar failures to shear
tests. I saw no natural avalanches, but the visibility was poor.

--
Christoph Dietzfelbinger, Mountain Guide
Bear Mountaineering and the Burnie Glacier Chalet
Box 4222 Smithers B.C. Canada V0J 2N0
info@bearmountaineering.ca www.bearmountaineering.ca
tel. 250-847-3351 fax 250-847-2854

Tuesday, January 17, 2006

[MCR] Hudson Bay Mountain 17 Jan 06

Skied to the observation site on the E side of Hudson Bay Mountain today. At
1100 hrs at the portal (1100 m), it was overcast, snowing lightly and 0
degrees. At 1500 m, it was -4 degrees and snowing. The visibility was
marginal, but we could see several size 1.5 soft slabs out of steep NE facing
and windloaded gullies. No large avalanches had run in this large and steep
path. A snow profile confirmed that the snowpack is now at about 130 cm for
this elevation. There are several instabilities in the 40-60 cm of recent
storm snow. More worrisome is a deep instability, almost 100 cm down, where we
found consistent easy to moderate shears, sudden planar, on facets on top of a
decaying crust. We did not ski down the path.

[MCR] Duffey Lake Road - sz 3.5 Avalanche in Joffre N Bowl

I just returned from a few days up at Keith's Hut on the Duffey. Deb and I
broke heavy trail up to the Hut (with the help of a couple of groups who
caught up to us!) in 60+ cm of fresh snow, and set a couple of up tracks
(the most work being up the N side of the ridge!) on Saturday. We spent
all of our time on the Hut Ridge.

Saturda and Sunday we noticed some wind effect in the alpine, but still
excellent ski quality on both S and N aspects of the ridge. Little natural
avalanche activity was noted apart from some loose surface sloughing
throughout the weekend. Light to moderate winds from the south until
Sunday afternoon.

Later on Sunday and throughout Monday the breeze stiffened, with
consistent S moderate to high winds causing scouring in the alpine and
rapid blossoming of cornices.

Of note, and some surprise, was a massive (sz 3.5) avalanche that occured
Sunday night, sweeping down the moraines below the N face of Mt. Joffre
and stepping down, in places, to the ground (as far as we could tell
through the mist). It reached down to about 5000 ft (and may have even
crossed the exit tracks leading to Cerise Ck), and was likely triggered by
windloading on the upper Joffre ridge several thousand feet above.

Ski quality yesterday (Monday) had worsened in the alpine from the wind
but was still excellent below treeline. Stability is definitely worsening,
especially with new snow (it was coming down hard again as we left and
still blowing).

Freezing levels yesterday evening were at about 1100 ft, and the icy
little hill north of Whistler Village was strewn with tourist vehicles
which caused us a 2 hr delay and forced us to use the 11:30 pm water taxi
back to Bowen Island and our little son Rohan!

Regards,
Tom Wolfe

Sunday, January 15, 2006

[MCR] Monahsee Mountains update JAn. 15/06

Just back from a work stint in the Monashee mountains wet of Revelstoke.

Over 140cm. of storm snow over the last week with storm snow shears tightening over the last 24-48hrs. Limited obs in the Alpine so not much to add there – lots of skiing at and below treeline. Even though storm snow shears continue to improve the overall characteristic of the snow over the Dec.26 crust (now down @170cm. in this area) is also changing as the storm snow settlement will increase the slab properties over this crust – the bond to the crust itself seems good for the most part but there are many places where it has a significant weak layer below the crust – in other words – hard to have any confidence in bigger or steeper/covnvex features for sure at this time.

More snow on the way tomorrow!!!

Cheers,

Scott Davis

Mountain Guide

[MCR] Callaghan Valley, Whistler

Spent the weekend working at Callaghan Country Lodge. Saturday was really deep trail breaking, and almost too deep to ski. Today the snow settled significantly and made for much easier travel. Saw no recent natural avalanches (lots of mid storm rubble though). Could not ski cut any of the usual test slopes. At 5500' there was a moderate compression test result down 30cm and another moderate/hard down 50cm - both planar. All in snow of F and 4F density. At tree line I rated the hazard as Considerable. The Alpine was looking wind hammered and slabby, we got to 6500' turned around (due to not fun looking skiing) and skiied down in a protected pocket. The skiing in tree line is very excellent.

Dave Sarkany, Ski Guide

Callaghan Country Lodge

Saturday, January 14, 2006

[MCR] Hudson Bay Mountain 14 Jan 06

Skied to the observation site at 1500 m on the E side of Hudson Bay Mountain
today. It is starting to look and feel like winter, but still bony and little
snow in the trees. -6.0 at 1300 hrs at 1600 m. Winds moderate and gusty from
the South. Moderate snow transport is starting to sculpt the alpine. HS ist
still only 90-120 cm at this elevation. We observed no natural avalanches at
all, not even in the steep cross-loaded gullies above the Right Twin Fall. The
recent wind-transported snow reacts to ski cutting. Shallow snowpack areas are
strongly facetted. Skiing quality in the protected lower gully was good. This
is probably not so as soon as there is wind exposure.

Wednesday, January 11, 2006

[MCR] Update on Monashee mountains

Update on Monashee mountains,

The snow continues out here in the Monashee mountains with 70-80 cms. of storm snow over the last 3 days. It has been highly reactive to skier triggering and there was a natural avalanche cycle Tuesday from the alpine into below treeline terrain with a significant wind event yesterday afternoon with the passing of the cold front yesterday afternoon. Today they are calling for another 20 cm. of snow - The December 26th crust is 85-100cm. deep at this point and has seen a lot of recent loading so it may soon start to become reactive.

In short the skiing is amazing but the hazard is quite high and the storm snow instabilities are deep enough now to produce significant avalanches - so be prudent in your run choice and be aware of overhead threat of larger terrain features that may produce large natural avalanche.

Ski Safe,

Scott Davis

Mountain Guide

Tuesday, January 10, 2006

[MCR] Ghost

Climbed Weathering Heights and Anorexia Nervosa today in the south
ghost. The road is completely dry. Almost no snow to speak of on the
approach.

WH was fat, and protect-able.

AN however, on the bottom pitch has almost completely sublimated. We
climbed the corner just left of the ice(or where it would be?) and came
in near the top of the original pitch. Surprisingly easy climbing
(M6ish), with tricky placements. We had a selection of wires, and three
medium cams and that did the trick. The second pitch was a little
hollow just after the second tier, but otherwise fine, and protect-able
throughout.

Aaron Beardmore
Mountain Guide

info@alpineview.ca
www.alpineview.ca

[MCR] Haffner

20cm's Hst in parking lot at Haffner creek today, low -2, high -1, snowing most of the day at 1 to2cm an hour. Had the place to ourselves, how rare. Ice is fat, watch out for 20 to 40cm sluffing off top of climbs.

Cheers

Todd Craig

Mtn guide

Monday, January 9, 2006

[MCR] Bear Spirit

Aaron Beardmore and I spent a recreational day climbing at Bear Spirit
today. There are 3 flows of ice, with the ice quality varying from a
fair bit of wet, aerated chandeliers to some good plastic ice. The
mixed lines have the best ice and are in good nick.

Light snow all day, with 5 cm of low density easy shovelling in my
driveway before dinner tonight. 10 cm at Lake Louise ski hill today
apparently, with good skiing reported. Just stay in-bounds, it's been
touchy out there with several skier triggered avalanches in the Lake
Louise backcountry the past few days.

Mark Klassen
Mountain Guide
mark@alpinism.com
www.alpinism.com

Sunday, January 8, 2006

[MCR] Campbell Icefields Dec 31-Jan 7

Just back from a week up at the Campbell Icefields Chalet north-east of Golden,
B.C. Dec 31-Jan 7. A great place to spend new years.

Quite a stormy week with 40-60cm of new snow throughout the week (35cm of which
fell on the evening of Jan 5). Only 2 days of weather good enough to go explore
in the high country (Jan 2 & 7), the rest of the days were spent close to
treeline so we could see something. Fog, fog and more fog was the theme of the
week... and snow!

We had 2 skier controlled avalanches (size 1.0) on convex south facing alpine
terrain during the snow and wind storm on the 5th, snow that had any wind effect
at all was reacting very easily with 15-20 degree slopes cracking and moving
slightly underfoot (some fractures travelling up to 15m). This reactivity
settled out quickly and the snowpack on the 6th was considerably more stable.
No natural activity was observed at all during the week. Wind effect was
restricted to alpine terrain only.

Deeper down in the snowpack (around 50cm from the surface) we found the mid
December facet layer, which in this particular area was rounding out well and
sheers were in the moderate range with a resistent fracture character (CTM 15
RP). The november facet/crust layer was present around 150cm from the surface
with hard, sudden fractures present (CTH 23 RP on SC size 2.0). There was, on
average, around 2m of snow on the ground at treeline, up to 220cm probed on the
Campbell Icefields proper.

We skied some rather committing terrain during the week but it was entirely on
slopes that had previously avalanched during the Dec 24 event. We turned away
from one large north facing slope at 2500m (around 37degrees) during the week
due to the shears in the snowpack, lack of past natural activity on the slope
and a rather committing kick turn on the slope over a rather large drop. In
general we were cautious with our terrain decisions throughout the week if the
slope had no evidence of previous natural activity.

When we left on the 7th I was calling the avalanche danger C/M/L with caution in
lee terrain.

Ian Tomm
Assistant Ski Guide
Canadian Avalanche Association

Saturday, January 7, 2006

[MCR] Bow Hut approach

Today (Jan 7) I spent the day with several RAC instructors doing a
training session. We went up towards Bow Hut just into the moraines
towards the Little Crowfoot Glacier.

At the parking lot it was scattered cloud, -8, 17 cm of storm snow from
the previous couple of days, light NW winds at ridgetop with signs of
previous significant wind transport at upper elevations. There was a
suspicious lack of avalanche activity.

There were several whumpfs noted heading up the trail, with one causing
cracking on adjacent slopes as we entered the canyon. Further up the
canyon one of the group stepped off the packed trail and propagated a
size 1 slab above, 20-30 cm deep, 7 m wide and running 15 m downslope
(photo). It was a storm snow slab with the failure layer being facets
lying on the ground.

We noted another larger size 1 in the moraines above our high point,
possibly remotely triggered by another party in the vicinity. It
occurred while we were digging a test profile (at treeline on a north
aspect).

In the profile there were no surprises: 40 cm of a variety of grains, 4
finger strength, lie atop 75 cm of facets and depth hoar, fist to 1
finger strength. Easy to moderate resistant planar shears at the storm
snow interface, hard sudden planar shears on the facets.

On return to the parking lot, on the west face of Observation Peak, we
saw a skier triggered size 1 which seemed to have remotely triggered a
large size 2.

Alpine: Considerable, Treeline: Considerable, Below Treeline:
Considerable where there is enough snow to overcome the ground
roughness, Low elsewhere. We seem to be just reaching threshold depths
below treeline now.

Confidence is low and consequences high; there are lots of rocks to hit
as you get dragged down by the swirling white vortex. Keep your head up
and your feet on the ground

Mark Klassen
Mountain Guide
mark@alpinism.com
www.alpinism.com.

[MCR] 3GirlsChinaClimbingFreeBeerShow

Sat. January 7th
8pm
The Vision Climbing Gym in Canmore
www.vsion.com

Presents:

Slides from the three girls in the Four Girl Mountains
Tales of Travel and Climbing in the remote Siguniang Mountain Range
Granite Walls and First Ascents in Western China

By:
Aidan Oloman, Katherine Fraser, Katy Holms
Tickets $5/7
One Free Beer Included

Friday, January 6, 2006

[MCR] Hudson Bay Mountain 6 Jan 06

At 1500 m on the E side of Hudson Bay Mountain it was -4.5 at noon. There was
no precipitation and the wind was light from the south.

20 cm of snow have fallen since New Year's day. There was very little wind
effect: the HS was 90 cm on the windward and 120 cm on the lee side. The
persistent weak layers - facets and surface hoar - are now 50 to 55 cm down.
They react consistently to shear tests.

We observed no natural avalanches at all, but did not feel confident enough to
enter steep open terrain. We felt several whumpfs that travelled tens of metres.

Thursday, January 5, 2006

[MCR] Johnsons/Finishing Hammer Gully

The last few days Erica and I did some recreational ice climbing.
Johnson's Canyon is workable with some open water around the climbing
area. Not much is in other than the easier stuff, we top-roped one
Grade 5-ish pillar which had just touched down. The rest hasn't really
come in.

Today (the 5th) we did Finishing Hammer Gully above Waterfowl Lakes.
This is a really nice little Grade 3 and recommended. Nary a speck of
snow in the area, which made for a low-stress day where there was about
10cm of new snow on the road over Bow Summit and howling winds all day
across the valley on Howse and Chepren. A bunch of rolling Grade 2 ice
leads to 2 short Grade 3 pitches. There were some fresh abalakovs left
over from a previous ascent, which we used for several 30 m raps before
taking to the steep frozen gravel and bushes beside the gully.

We were less thankful for the frozen turd at about the only flat spot
at the base of the route, where we roped up. I was standing right in it
for several minutes before realizing the grim reality. Poor form,
whoever did that!

We heard a couple of rumbles from across the valley; could have been
avalanches or icefall I suppose.

Mark Klassen
Mountain Guide
mark@alpinism.com
www.alpinism.com

[MCR] Lilly

Skied up to the Lilly Glacier today with Jordy Shepherd, with the intent of doing the loop around to the Asulkan. High humidity, moderate winds and snow transport from today and previous days’ storm snow has established soft slabs of varying thickness (5 cm to 90 cm). We turned around at the base of the glacier due to low visibility, whumphing, shooting cracks, and we could hear avalanches running up in the alpine – stability was deteriorating quickly. We managed to cut a sz 1.0 during the descent above the large approach moraine; not surprising given the conditions. It slid on the 30-40 cm down storm interface then stepped down to the Dec 25 crust, but noteworthy was that it was able to propagate through a thin section of slab (maybe 2-3 cm thick), then over to another small convex roll and release it as well. Keep that in mind as you get near, some of those steeper moraine features at treeline and above.

Stability:

Alpine: Poor

Treeline Fair

Below Treeline: Moderate

Cheers,

Kirk Mauthner

Full Asst. Guide

[MCR] Pearly Rock

Skied up to Pearly Rock with Lee Johnston today.

The dump that we hoped for turned out to be a measly trickle of a few
centimeters. However, there were moderate to strong winds throughout the
day which helped build lots of thin soft slabs reactive to the skis. Ski
cut a soft slab sz 1.5, running on recent storm snow. Moderate
trailbreaking with fair to good skiing down -- the surface has firmed up a
lot with the wind above treeline. Little whoomfing, but lots of cracking
and little sloughs. The route up to Pearly Rock is tricky to do safely
even with good visibility, and careful routefinding will still bring you
onto one steep slope (the triangular moraine).

Alpine -- Considerable (steep windloaded features are a bad idea right
now) TL - Considerable BTL - Moderate

Regards,
Tom Wolfe
Ass't Alpine Guide
_______________________________________________
These observations and opinions are those of the person who submitted them. The ACMG and its members take no responsibility for errors, omissions, or lapses in continuity. Conditions differ greatly over time and space due to the variable nature of mountain weather and terrain. Application of this information provides no guarantee of increased safety. Do not use the Mountain Conditions Report as the sole factor in planning trips or making decisions in the field.
Please check out http://acmg.ca/mcr for more information.

[MCR] O Le Tab / Lacy Gibbet

Oh Le Tab, December 30th
The route took a bit if a beating during the warm spell but was still very
climbable with a bit of cleaning. Very little snow (0-5cm) on the
approach and immediately above the route when we did it but this may have
changed. Most routes in the bowl above seemed to be in pretty good shape
but I am not sure how much new snow has fallen since I was there.

Lacy Gibbet, January 2nd
No snow on the approach and all but the last pitch are in great shape.
Last pitch is very wet and rotten but should be in great shape if (when)
things cool down a little.

Both of these routes are in sun traps and deteriorate very fast in the
heat of the day.

Cheers,

Marc Piche

Mountain Guide

Wednesday, January 4, 2006

[MCR] Loop Brook to Asulkan

Sorry Gang,

Slots easy to get around on the Lilly on the other right, what I meant to say was the climbers LEFT.

Also, good skiing at WH20 (nelson) with 30ish in the last 3 days!

Cheers,

Scott Grady

Assistant Ski Guide

Yahoo! DSL Something to write home about. Just $16.99/mo. or less

[MCR] Loop Brook to Asulkan

Happy New Year!

Skied up Loop Brook to the Lilly for a quaint bivy below Sapphire Col on Jan 02/06. Lots of alder bashing and open creek crossings (bring a life jacket and rubber dingy, maybe we should have Swiftwater Rescue incorporated into the ski guide program if global warming continues...) lower down below the Lilly moraine feature. Lilly glacier easy to bypass on climbers right with broken ground in the middle and climbers right. Climbed the steep pitch to Sapphire Col in the morning with a 10 -15 cm of new sitting on the Dec 25 crust. Slab had not set up until near the top of the climb near a steep convex feature, which pulled out a 0.5 soft slab (ski cut (?) down 10cm, 15m wide and ran 20-30m), not really of any consequence but sporty in some regards. Excellent ski quality (30-40cm of storm) down beside the Dome, however whiteout conditions provided exc ellent opportunities for touchy feely snowplowing techniques and roped skiing fun! Ski quality decreases and becomes industrial below treeline with 10-15 cm of dust on crust.

Also skied Lookout Notch to Asulkan on Jan 01. Approach to the Illisilly (practice slopes) looking very thin, with many rocks and moraine feature still poking out. Bowl below Lookout Notch has slid with last rain storm and was covered with a thin dusting providing "rodeo like" skiing conditions, avalanche path below is filled with many x-mas trees and hazards. Temps feeling very mild (-6.0 at 9:00pm on Jan 02 on Lilly below Sapphire Col) throughout stay at R.P.

Cheers,

Scott Grady

Assistant Ski Guide

Yahoo! DSL Something to write home about. Just $16.99/mo. or less

[MCR] Lilly - Dome

Skied the Lilly - Dome traverse today with fellow aspiring Ski Guides Lee
Johnston and Ian Kirschner. Moderate trailbreaking up to the col and
excellent fresh tracks down to the Asulkan. There is 30-50 cm of mainly
unconsolidated snow on top of the Dec 25 rain crust now. Where wind
affected (on our tour just below the col, both sides) there is a soft slab
reactive to skis with fast, easy shears on the Dec 25 crust. This was a
bit of a surprise since elsewhere we've noted that the new snow was
bonding well to the crust. We didn't examine the interface carefully but
there is probably some facetting responsible down there.

We kicked off a SSL sz 1.5-2.0 on the steep roll on the north side of the
col on the way down (40 cm deep, 50 m wide, ran about 100 m total) as the
leader cautiously entered the slope -- not exactly a ski cut, not exactly
a surprise either. A little lower (2350 m) there is little wind affect
down to the valley bottom.

Alp - Considerable
Treeline - Considerable
BTL - Moderate

FAntastic skiing in the Pass -- tonight calls for a heavy dump which will
mean a sharp increase in Avalanche Danger top to bottom.

Tuesday, January 3, 2006

[MCR] Bow Falls amphitheater

Climbed in the Bow Falls area today. Strong westerly winds in the pm. I would guess it was howling on the Wapta. Overcast with only very light snowfall, -5 to -8c.

Generally poor conditions in the Bow Falls area. Snow conditions on all the approach aprons were wildly variable and often spooky. Lots of the bigger aprons I avoided as they were fat and the consequences were low but ugly. The ice was HARD(felt like -30c ice) and even with lethally sharp picks I was having to pound like a caveman to get a stick and then of course had to yank like a fool to get them out. Not very aesthetic.

It is possible to walk around the lake and up to the routes without skiis or snowshoes for now. The walking was better than the climbing.

Larry Stanier

Mountain Guide

[MCR] Metal Dome, Whistler - Blackcomb Powder Cats conditions

Metal dome area, storm snow was transported on ridges up to 125cm with foot pen up to 95cm. Sledders spent the day digging their noisy machines out of the snow and making jumps!

New snow has strong bonding (no naturals and no sled starts). Pit results: nw 1500m 38degree hs 205cm 126cm to wet grains. New snow consistent /r 1-2 1f, 25cm cte7 / 2 sp, 40cm cte7 +/2 sp, 55cm ctm14 /2 sp, 85cm cth28 /1sp.

Snow temps are west coast - 0cm -4.6 10cm -1.8 gradually rising to +.4 100cm.

Happy New snow year!

Richard Haywood

Monday, January 2, 2006

[MCR] Callaghan Valley by Powder Mt.

Spent the 31st /Jan 1st at Callaghan Country Lodge (about 25 km SW of Whistler) skiing in the tree line (4500- 5500'). At the 4500' (Lodge ) Wx station there was 210cm yesterday late afternoon. At the 5200' snow plot there was 3-4 meters of snow; there is 120 cm of snow over the Xmass crust (which is 5cm thick) and about a meter of wet snow below all this. The creeks at tree line are still open but starting to ice over. 1 natural size 1 avalanche on a Nw aspect slope at 5700', and start zones on similar aspects are reactive to ski cutting. The fractures are running only in the new snow. Ski penetration is 50cm and the skiing quality is excellent.

It feels a bit more like winter!

Dave Sarkany

Ski Guide

Callaghan Country Backcountry Lodge

Sunday, January 1, 2006

[MCR] Hudson Bay Mountain

Trashed to the 1500 m observation site on the E side of Hudson Bay
Mountain today.Very low snow cover in the trees. 90 cm at 1500 m. Little
wind effect in the alpine. No natural avalanches observed, but several
whumpfs occurred. A profile at 1500 m in an E aspect showed 40 cm of
recent snow above several strongly facetted crusts. There were
consistent collapses on a facetted layer below a crust 50 cm down. There
is well preserved surface hoar 45 cm down, but no shears occurred on it.
The skiing quality was good where there was enough snow in the main
path, which was infrequent.
--
Christoph Dietzfelbinger
Mountain Guide, Bear Mountaineering and Burnie Glacier Chalet
Box 4222
Smithers, B.C. V0J 2N0 Canada
tel. 250-847-3351 fax: 250-847-2854
info@bearmountaineering.ca www.bearmountaineering.ca
_______________________________________________
These observations and opinions are those of the person who submitted them. The ACMG and its members take no responsibility for errors, omissions, or lapses in continuity. Conditions differ greatly over time and space due to the variable nature of mountain weather and terrain. Application of this information provides no guarantee of increased safety. Do not use the Mountain Conditions Report as the sole factor in planning trips or making decisions in the field.
Please check out http://acmg.ca/mcr for more information.

[MCR] Bow/Balfour

Kathy, Will and I spent Dec 29-31 wandering about the Wapta Icefield.

Over the trip winds were generally moderate from the west, with strong
winds at ridgetops on Dec 30. Moderate snow transport at ridgetop most
of the time. Max of -6 at Bow Lake Dec 29, minimum -15 at Olive/St Nick
col Dec 29. -9.5 at Bow Hut the morning of Dec 31. Regular flurries
left a few cm of new snow over the trip. Visibility varied from
obscured to broken.

Approach to Bow Hut is as per my post for Little Crowfoot a few days
ago. Up on the ice we saw about 2 m of snow at around 2700 m at the
head of the Bow Glacier, with deeper snowpacks at higher elevations in
sheltered areas. The light was never very good but it seemed that the
icefield was quite smooth with few visible crevasses. Ski penetration
was generally ankle deep, minimal wind effect in the most recent
snowfalls although with probing it seemed there was a 40cm thick wind
slab atop a thin weakness, beneath the 10-15cm soft surface snow
layers. Cornices are large.

On the 30th poor visibility, loading winds, occasionally intense
flurries, suspected large cornices and unknown crevasse difficulties
created too many "ifs" for us to go from Balfour Hut over the Balfour
High Col to Scott Duncan. I like to have good visibility or a Low to
Moderate Danger rating (or, better yet, both) to consider committing to
that place. We had neither so we climbed Olive on the way back to Bow
that day.

Good skiing on the Bow Glacier on Dec 30 and 31. Lots of people though.

The only avalanche activity we saw was exiting on Dec 31. A large size
2 had run sometime in the previous 24 hours in the path beyond the end
of Bow Lake, on the south flank of Mt Jimmy Simpson. It came out of
steep, unskiable cliffs and gullies to the right of the waterfalls. It
was a slab, about 40cm thick, initiating on a steep slope in the lee of
a ridge at treeline and cleaning out the cliffs below. It ran about 2/3
of the fan in the runout zone.

I'm also pretty sure I heard a sizeable avalanche off Olive during the
wind event of Dec 30, but couldn't see it in poor visibility.

I rated the Danger as Considerable in the alpine and treeline and Low
below treeline, throughout the trip.

Mark Klassen
Mountain Guide
mark@alpinism.com
www.alpinism.com

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