Small wind slab avalanche on Castle Peak

Our party of three was traveling from the Donner Summit Sno-Park with the objective of reaching the Castle Peak North Gullies. Our plan was to gain the ridge following the trail to Grubb Hut, roughly follow the Castle Peak summer trail, ski laps on the gullies, and then head south to exit to a shuttle at the I-80 Rest Stop.

No signs were of instability were observed near the skin track up the valley. Upon gaining the ridge, the SW wind became very strong. Estimated sustained 30 mph with much higher gusts. Around 8,500', we began to see signs of freshly despositing windblown snow, along with with extemely icy scoured patches. The fresh snow was 1-3 inches in places, and broke away in dinner plate sized slabs from the old snow layer. Considering weather and snow conditions, we decided to abandon our plan and take a short run through the mellow trees down to the meadow to our WNW. We tranisitioned to descend in a small stand of trees just north of the ridgeline.

Skier 1 descended first WNW directly towards the meadow. A couple turns in and just past a rollover, he realized the snow deposits on this feature were significantly deeper than expected. He attempted to slowly traverse off the feature, but a 12" slab broke a foot above him and swept him off his his feet. He was carried about 15 feet before he was able to stand and ride out the slide to skiers right. He was unhurt. The slide continued to run about 100 feet to a lower angle slope.

Skiers 2 and 3 were able to retrace more of the skin track to reach Skier 1 below the treeline. This also proved difficult due to the wind and varying icy/deposit conditions near the ridge, but no slides occurred.