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Avalanche: Greaseball

Observer Name
KToohey,TRolfs,ARolfs
Observation Date
Thursday, February 8, 2024
Avalanche Date
Wednesday, February 7, 2024
Region
Salt Lake » Big Cottonwood Canyon » Kessler Peak » Greaseball
Location Name or Route
Greaseball & Argenta
Elevation
10,200'
Aspect
North
Trigger
Natural
Avalanche Type
Soft Slab
Avalanche Problem
New Snow
Weak Layer
Density Change
Depth
12"
Width
100'
Vertical
1,500'
Comments
Travelled up Argenta today, beautiful morning for a walk. At 8,500' we observed debris likely avalanching in yesterday afternoons high PI period, debris was covered in ~2-4 inches of fresh snow. Sighted crowns in Greaseball located ~200ft off the upper ridgeline, with a full runout of ~1,700ft entraining some but not all new snow off the walls in the small gully. Crowns estimated no larger than ~12 inches in depth and ~50' wide. Failure was deemed to be a density change within new snow.
SS-N-R4-D2-S (Greaseball)
Hard to say how the avalanches started whether from rapid loading or snow cascading off the cliffs in turn triggering the soft slabs below. Additionally, hard to determine if the two paths connected or slid separately.The top face of Argenta ran to the upper bench ~800' from the ridge with a noticeably shallower debris pile but pulled out ~150' wide. No observed crowns for the Argenta slide around the base of the cliffs, potentially covered by new snow and wind. SS-N-R3-D1.5 (Argenta)
Coordinates