Good Morning. This is Doug Chabot with the Gallatin National Forest Avalanche Center with early season avalanche information issued on Saturday, October 29 at 8 a.m. Today’s bulletin is sponsored by Grizzly Outfitters, our title sponsor for last Friday’s Powder Blast. This information will be updated as conditions change.
At 0730 many weather stations are reporting fresh snow. The Bridger Range got dusted, the Hyalites are showing 3”, and the Yellowstone Club has 7” as does the southern Madison Range and higher elevations outside Cooke City. The mountains around West Yellowstone received a lot of water (1.5”), but above freezing temperatures kept snowfall amounts under a few inches. Mountain temperatures are near freezing and winds are southeast in the mountains around Bozeman and west to southwest at 20-25 mph everywhere else. The brunt of the storm has passed and drier air today and tomorrow morning will give way to wetter and cooler air Sunday evening.
The avalanche concerns are the same: fresh, wind-drifted snow are where you’ll find the best turns and also the greatest avalanche potential. Be extra careful crossing wind-loaded gullies and small slopes above large cliffs. Even small slides can injure and kill. Hunters, ice-climbers and skiers are all in the same pool of risk this time of year.
What Alex wrote on October 19 is still true today:
It’s time to get the skis and boards ready to slide, but don’t leave home without your avalanche beacon, shovel, and probe. Put fresh batteries in your beacon, check your shovel and probe for damage, and practice using all of them.
Slopes with the deepest snow will be the most attractive for travel, but they also have the highest potential to avalanche. Wind drifted new snow could be more than a foot deep near ridgelines and in wind-loaded gullies, where it will be possible to trigger an avalanche. Avalanches could be large enough to bury a person, and even a small slide this time of year can have large consequences due to thin snow cover and exposed rocks. Choose terrain cautiously and travel one at a time in avalanche terrain, whether climbing or descending.
Hunters should avoid avalanche terrain, as they often travel alone or without avalanche rescue gear. Small slopes can slide and easily bury a person in confined terrain features like a gully or a steep road-cut. Avalanches have caught and injured skiers, hunters, and climbers during the early-season before. Travel and prepare for avalanches like you would in the middle of winter.
We will update this information as conditions change. In the meantime, we need your observations, so if you get out please drop us a line at mtavalanche@gmail.com or call 406-587-6984.
2 November, Avalanche Awareness, 6-7:30 p.m.at REI.
9 November, Thinking Local Skiing Global: MSU Snow and Avalanche Workshop 2016, 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. at MSU SUB Ballroom A. More info HERE.
16 November, Avalanche Awareness, 6-7:30 p.m. at MSU Yellowstone Hall.
30 Nov. and 1 Dec., Introduction to Avalanches with Field Course, 7-9:30 p.m. at MSU Sub Ballroom B: Sign up HERE.
2 December, Avalanche Awareness, 6-7:30 p.m. at REI.
15 December, Avalanche Awareness and Beacon Practice, 6-8 p.m. at Beall Park.
BILLINGS
15 November, Avalanche Awareness, 6-7:30 p.m. at The Basecamp.
BIG SKY
16 November, Avalanche Awareness, 7-8:30 p.m. at Grizzly Outfitters.
HELENA
8 December, Avalanche Awareness, 6-7:30 p.m. at The Basecamp.
WEST YELLOWSTONE
15 and 16 December, Snowmobile Introduction to Avalanches w/ Field Day, West Yellowstone Holiday Inn Conference Hotel. More info and sign up HERE.