Christmas Day, 2007, Alpental, In bounds

Skiing on Christmas day was wonderful at Alpental today. Roughly, 20-30cm of high density snow, and a little more snow deposited by wind on NE- NW facing slopes. Great skiing for the most part, but a little slabby and there were obvious signs of recent activity all around the area. On my last ride up Chair 2 at 11:40am I witnessed a little kid set off a small 30cm slab right under the chair. An awesome experience for him no doubt, and hopefully a learning one. Then, a little farther up the chair above the cliffs that were closed, a snowboarder ducked the rope, and launched the cliff; when he landed he set off a 40-50cm crown fracture and was able to ride off of it. Pretty lucky, but if someone had been below him, they could have been buried. This is the best part: One would assume these were obvious signs of instability and there was good reason that the ski patrol had closed the BC, but some skiers behind me who ALSO saw 2 avalanches from the chair, then decided to duck the rope to the BC and go into Elevator Gate. FYI, apparently a few days ago, Elevator Gate slid all the way to ground when Pro Patrol approached the top of the slope and created a collapse in the snowpack. I just don't get it? Are skiers around here more naive or stupider than elsewhere in the US? Are we in need of a complete overhaul of Alpental patrol policies? Any insight as to why Alpental can't require a beacon, shovel, probe, partner policy would be very helpful to me. There are plenty of other areas that can do this just fine....

We were there too--but stuck to St. Bernard. Heard the same reports that you were giving regarding avy hazards, and spent the day describing snow stability and avalanche danger to my son as best I could. We stayed until 3pm and it is snowing heavily again!

Are skiers around here more naive or stupider than elsewhere in the US?  Are we in need of a complete overhaul of Alpental patrol policies?  Any insight as to why Alpental can't require a beacon, shovel, probe, partner policy would be very helpful to me.  There are plenty of other areas that can do this just fine....

Definitely a good day up there.  Was plesantly surprised by how empty the place was....we were still finding untracked snow even on our last run at 1pm.  And hitting Shot 6 right after the patrol opened it was fantastic.

Skiers around here aren't any stupider than anywhere else, but we're usually blessed with a much more forgiving snowpack so folks can get away with doing things that might not be the best idea.  It was definitely interesting riding up Chair 2 and seeing those fresh crowns and debris....some folks just have to duck ropes I guess.  The crowns though didn't look more than 12" deep, so I am assuming that the snow that is releasing is just the new snow that came down in the last storm...I didn't see any evidence of the slides stepping down to a lower layer, but then again the distance that the avies traveled was small, so it probably didn't get a chance to really get moving.

I wouldn't expect the Alpental backcountry to change anytime soon.  Adding the requirement of avy gear would cut down on the number of folks who could go out there and I imagine that plenty of folks would head out there sans avy gear and get in to trouble.  I think the ski patrolers are doing an admirable job trying to keep things safe on the hill this year.    

Was up there too. Got three runs untracked on the lower runs. Heavy stuff but manageable. Chair 2 was fun. Worst snow was in Edelweiss Bowl had a solid crust from above Schulct down to the bowl exit. Breakover and the trees were excellent. Nash was good after the first 30 yards. Wish Snake was open but looking at lower Snake from the top of chair 3 I could see why it was closed. Lots of trees showing. I bet the rocks above were still really exposed.

Left before the dump (and returning holiday traffic).

Nothing like Alpy on Xmas!

 And hitting Shot 6 right after the patrol opened it was fantastic.

Agreed!
I saw the lower slide go under Chair 2 while on the lift (shallow small slab, looked like it carried the rider a short distance, but didn't take him long to excavate his buried ski from the snowy rubble...probably not the type of Christmas surprise he was looking for...).

Found face shots on just about every run; my legs were jell-o by noon; another great Christmas Day morning at the Alp!

We were up there ~ 11-1. So much better than Central and West, where we started out. I was impressed that lower International under the cliffs was not a morass of submerged death cookies; it was actually pretty nice. It started snowing in earnest about 2:30 PM; back at Central the snow started to improve. Nosedive, etc. still had rather lower coverage. They had Silver Fir open but again the coverage on most of the runs was marginal. Should be great today.