Natural Avalanche on Echo Peak

A friend with a great view of Echo Peak from his house texted me this morning that it looked the the main bowl slid. I decided to check it out and started touring near the base of Flagpole Peak where I could see a crown on the ridgeline just to the south of Flagpole proper. Similar to the observation posted on 1/29 the approach was a little challenging due to the thin conditions and lingering low density snow over manzanita bushes. My partner definitely fell skinning on the flat approach when the snow gave way on a bush and it's possible I stumbled as well. 

New snow was minimal (1-2 inches)in the flats below 6600 feet. While new snow increased as we gained elevation, depth was highly varied depending on wind influence with open areas mostly firm wind scoured surface conditons. North facing treed terrain held about 6 inches of snow.

I had hoped to have a good vista of the slide from the bench at 7400 feet but thick cloud cover sabatoged that dream. With the naked eye we could see a crown at the top of the bowl. The crown extended accross almost the entire width of the main bowl. This location is frequent slider and the crown was similar to others I have seen here. We couldn't see evidence of the slide stepping down into deeper older layers of the snowpack. While the edges of the crown seemed sharp and recent, there was not much visible evidence of flanks, path or debris from our vista. 

Photo 1: Natural crown on south ridge of Flagpole Peak

Photo 2: Firm crust on a scoured surface at 6600 feet. 

Photo 3: The approach to Echo has just enough snow to travel on but the snowpack hasn't consolidated enough and manzanita traps wait for the unsuspecting. 

Photo 4: Photo is less clear than the actual views were, but the crown crosses the entire upper bowl of Echo Peak. 

Photo 5: After undercutting this small north facing slope with a skin track, it easily cracked while skinning across it. This was in the trees but on the edge of a small ridge and wind had loaded this feature and slabbed up the snow as it did so. 

Photo 6: Quick look at the snowpack here on a north facing near tree line slope at 7400 close the test slope that cracked. Wind slab density change visible with the F hard snow below the 4F hard snow at the surface. 12/11 facets were present in the bottom roughly 15 cms of this 140 cm snowpack. This area was a bit of a boulder field and the height of the facet layer was highly variable. The facets themselves were less loose than what I have observed recently.