Sometimes we are just wrong. Yesterday, I stopped just below an area at Rogers Pass called the Mouse Trap. It is a natural regroup spot and decision point. The Mouse Trap is a giant terrain trap, affected by large avalanches.
In a discussion regarding conditions and whether to proceed or not, we heard a rumble. It got louder and louder, to the point where we made the initial motions to start running. The snow was pounding; the fog was thick. The rumbling stopped, but fog prevented our view up the Mouse Trap. We stayed put. Realistically, we were in a pretty safe spot.
It was obvious that conditions where shitty. Overnight 20-40 cm fell with really warm temperatures. The missing ingredient in my mind was wind. No wind, no avalanches. The wind was not blowing yet, at least that is what I thought. I was trying to justify how to walk through the Mouse Trap and up to the tree triangle below the Asulkan Hut. Make a few runs and slide home.
The cold front was upon us. It was snowing 3 or 4 cm per hour and the wind had picked up, at least in the alpine. We were below a very wind exposed place at Rogers Pass. The slopes above are subjected to heavy cross loading. The hour of the avalanches had come.
As we were getting ready to go home, the fog cleared out of the Mouse Trap, and a pile of debris blocked its upper entrance. A natural avalanche came down and ran across it. It didn’t have the momentum to run down the Mouse Trap. A ski run and avalanche path called the Ravens pulled out. The avalanche likely ran on a sun crust. It was a size 3.0 and put 3-5 m of debris in the creek.
Just as we started to leave another rumble started. It sounded like the path that we were adjacent to was coming down. We were already in a safe zone, but skied away instead of watching. We avoided the avalanche runouts on our ski out of the valley.
My assessment and judgment was off. I’m not sure if I would have skied up there or not, but I was certainly figuring out how I wanted to do it and not simply pulling the pin.
I’m not sure if this statement makes any sense to most people, but I’m glad this happened to me. I have a tendency to try and thread the needle, especially if conditions are poor. The problem with threading the needle is that, if you miss the eye, you pay.
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