Avalanche: West Porter

MAC

Salt Lake » Mill Creek Canyon » Porter Fork » West Porter

West Porter

9,100'

Northeast

Skier

2'

100'

Beautiful morning out in West Porter, careful to stay off the steep sides on either side (though I noticed someone had set a skinner to the eastish-facing ridge between West Porter and the area commonly known as Thayne's Glade, which seemed a bold choice given conditions). If you're familiar with WP, you know there's an area off to looker's right that commonly slides (and seems to have some thermal activity as the rocks rarely stay covered for long). There were multiple tracks lightly skirting this terrain feature, and I added mine...then noticed the snow spidering below me. I know that drill, and kept skiing across the slope until I got into the dense trees and stopped to look back and observe. Once the snow broke (1-2' deep crown, failing on the PWL, unsurprisingly), it went fast, though it lost steam 100ish feet down as the slope moderates. It never got particularly deep, but it was moving fast enough that anyone unfortunate enough to be in its past would have been knocked off their feet and buried, though likely only partially. It wasn't particularly consequential terrain, but it reminded me of a few things: 1/ tracks aren't a sign of safety, as has been observed by UAC multiple times over the last week. They're just a sign that someone else got lucky. Mine were probably the fifth set of tracks, and I went maybe one foot higher on the slope. That's all it took. 2/ I'm guessing it was a combination of the new snow, PWL, and the rocky starting zone (which seems to also have been in play in the Brighton avalanche last week) that combined. Well, those same conditions exist all along that ridge between WP and Thayne's Glade. Someone got lucky setting the skinner up to the ridge and skiing back down, but that terrain they went through looks a lot like the Butler Basin terrain that resulted in a serious avalanche Saturday. I saw a similar skinner set in Thermal Bowl (the area off the backside of WP, below South Thayne's Peak): right along the rocks at the top, which is arguably the most likely starting zone. Years ago I remember reading a description of technical debt in software that seems appropriate to some of the skinners and ski tracks I've seen this season (and almost certainly that I've done myself at some point): "We are building skyscraper favelas in code—in earthquake zones." Sometimes, maybe usually, we get lucky with our bad choices. But it's better to be smart than lucky. Today was a gentle reminder that the snow has *not* settled down, and that, truly, "discretion is the better part of valor."