Cornices and Wind Loading on Tamarack Peak

With high snow levels we decided to go to Tamarack Peak to see how much snow had fallen at higher elevations and to look for evidence of wind slab avalanche conditions.

Throughout the tour we encountered over 2 feet of heavy moist snow with varying surface conditions including dense wind effected snow, drier snow and rime crusts in some locations too. The snowpack was showing signs of settling (see photo 1).

As we headed toward the East Ridge of Tamarack Peak we observed a natural avalanche on north facing near treeline terrain with a crown heighth of approximately 16" (see pin drop location on map). We were not able to safely approach the avalanche or get a great photo of it due to flat light and fog, but on investigation we observed another natural avalanche at a similar location with some snowfall on the debris suggesting that it occured late last night or very early morning  (photo 2).

We continued up the East Ridge to a known wind loading area and observed built out cornices and more evidence of natural avalanches (debris covered with recent snowfall suggesting similar late night/early am time). Cautious cornice kicking lead to some medium cornice peices falling and triggering approximately 1 foot deep wind slabs below (photo 3).

On descent we paused to dig a snowpit to get a baseline on the start of the 2019-20 season snowpack. We observed a mostly right side up snowpack of 167 cm deep. The faceted snow at the bottom is showing signs of rounding (see snowpit graph).