Avalanche: West Scotties

Observer Name
KP, IK, CP, SJ
Observation Date
Friday, April 3, 2026
Avalanche Date
Friday, April 3, 2026
Region
Salt Lake » Little Cottonwood Canyon » White Pine » West Scotties
Location Name or Route
Scotties
Elevation
9,700'
Aspect
Northeast
Slope Angle
Unknown
Trigger
Skier
Avalanche Type
Soft Slab
Avalanche Problem
New Snow
Weak Layer
Density Change
Depth
12"
Width
15'
Vertical
Unknown
Caught
1
Carried
1
Comments

While breaking trail in Upper Scotties before reaching the ridge, we popped a 8-12" storm slab that ran over our skinner below. Failed on what looked like a thaw/freeze layer, poor bonding with the new snow, which was 12-18".

2 more in our party were below a bit, we yelled and radioed of incoming slide. 1 of them, as they were making a kick turn, got hit about knee deep and pulled downhill only about 6 ft but the slide stopped pretty quickly after that. Enough it scared him pretty good.

The other skier was behind a tree and was not affected. Observations: we noticed some natural avie debris in Scottie's Bowl. As we were climbing above that prior to the slide, we had reactive snow with some fracturing. We had some notion of instability and the 3 of us were moving spaced apart. The other 2 were much further down below us.

Coordinates