Cardiff fork11/29/2022
Headed up Cardiff Fork from BCC today. It was more like a field day than a ski day. There was probably a foot of new light density snow at the trailhead increasing to around 18 inches at 9600ft. I knew we had the setup for avalanches but wasn’t seeing much of a cohesive slab at first. By the time we got above 8700ft the snow was a bit denser and settling out. Went to my favorite test hill and remotely triggered an avalanche from 40ft away. The slide was 17 inches deep, 160ft wide on a NW facing slope, 45degress, and ran on the facets that have formed over the last few weeks. The discouraging thing is the slide did not clean out any of the facets, only the new snow slid and left the now PWL intact. There was no evidence of a widespread avalanche cycle in upper Cardiac. It looked like there were multiple storm snow slides on the ridge during the storm but not any real crowns and the bowl looked like sluffing only. The rock slabs above Ivory Flakes looked to have sluffed or slid during the storm but still no visible large crowns and zero had moved on all the W facing including Holy Toledo. The weak layer has been preserved and buried and I don’t trust it. The SE has a thin melt freeze crust capping the facets but in my book that makes a recipe for larger and more connected slides. That being said, I'm not talking about the South on skier compacted terrain like the Emma’s across from Alta. I'm talking about the SE that is more pristine. I will be holding my cards tight and with another large storm predicted on Friday all bets are off. Hopefully the next storm will contain more water weight and wind cause a big clean out is what we really need right now.
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