{"id":21759,"date":"2020-03-07T09:45:47","date_gmt":"2020-03-07T16:45:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.skyhinews.com\/?p=63619"},"modified":"2020-03-07T09:45:47","modified_gmt":"2020-03-07T16:45:47","slug":"one-year-later-experts-look-back-on-historic-avalanche-cycle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/local-news\/one-year-later-experts-look-back-on-historic-avalanche-cycle\/","title":{"rendered":"One year later, experts look back on historic avalanche cycle"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
A view of the “Silent Bob” avalanche path as seen from the Frisco recpath Thursday, March 5, 2020. <\/strong>
Liz Copan \/ ecopan@summitdaily.com<\/em><\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

FRISCO \u2014 Kreston Rohrig stood gathered among his colleagues at the Colorado Avalanche Information Center last winter, trying to determine just how dangerous conditions in the Summit County backcountry had gotten over the past few days.<\/p>\n

Storm after storm was pounding the area, dumping seemingly endless piles of snow onto the slopes, just to break away in giant slabs onto roadways and valleys below. And with devastating avalanches wreaking havoc<\/a> in turn around the state \u2014 and a new, massive slide path<\/a> having emerged overnight on Peak One in Frisco \u2014 there was seemingly only one real answer: the danger had become extreme.<\/p>\n

Forecasters like Rohrig measure danger on a five-point scale, from low to extreme. But pushing the scale to the far right is exceptionally rare, and less than a week earlier even Rohrig likely would have dismissed the idea as laughable.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the end of February, the snowpack was strong and deep and looking really good,\u201d Rohrig said. \u201cThe only thing that could have kicked off a big cycle was a massive trigger or a huge snowstorm. And that\u2019s exactly what we got.\u201d<\/p>\n

Still, there was hesitation even among the experts.<\/p>\n

\u201cOn March 7, storms had continued, and we were already seeing catastrophic avalanches,\u201d Rohrig recalled. \u201cI still remember that morning specifically, and I will forever. \u2026 How often do people see us go to extreme? It\u2019s not often. It\u2019s kind of like a unicorn; it\u2019s there, but you never use it.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were tiptoeing around the issue, and I remember our Deputy Director Brian (Lazar) said, \u2018If not now, when?\u2019 We went to extreme danger in four zones, and that proved to be the right call. It was just absolutely mayhem. And iconically, that\u2019s when Silent Bob out there ripped out and destroyed a massive swath of forest.\u201d<\/p>\n

It was a year ago today that Frisco residents woke up to a new slide path <\/a>between Peak One and Mount Victoria, which has since been named \u201cSilent Bob\u201d among locals<\/a> due to its proximity to the J Chute \u2014 a nod to the iconic stoner duo Jay and Silent Bob from Kevin Smith\u2019s \u201cClerks.\u201d A year later, Rohrig is hoping to put into perspective just how historic the avalanche cycle was last March.<\/p>\n

Rohrig, who serves as the Colorado Avalanche Information Center\u2019s backcountry avalanche forecaster for the Vail and Summit County regions, gave a presentation on last year\u2019s avalanche cycle at Highside Brewing in Frisco earlier this week.<\/p>\n

Like with most avalanche cycles, the foundation was laid early on. Early season snow in October set a relatively weak base layer in the snowpack, typically a bad sign for avalanche conditions. But with good snow conditions over the coming months, the snowpack was considered strong and stable by the end of February. <\/p>\n

But in early March, the state was hit with back-to-back-to-back \u201catmospheric river\u201d events moving in from Southern California. The three major storms hit March 3, 4 and 6, dropping between 2 1\/2 and 7 feet of snow in areas around the Western Slope.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn Colorado, if we get a foot of snow that\u2019s pretty exciting,\u201d Rohrig said. \u201cWhen we get 7 feet, that\u2019s overwhelming. \u2026 With that snow, we started seeing a bunch of avalanches. This huge spike was just way more than the snowpack could handle. As far as the event, it was pretty amazing.\u201d<\/p>\n

While snowfall for the season failed to reach historic levels, the storm cycle in March certainly did. According to Rohrig, citing SNOTEL snowfall data, Copper Mountain recorded its largest 10-day and seven-day storms in at least the past 40 years.<\/p>\n

And while the cycle wasn\u2019t particularly long \u2014 avalanche danger was back to moderate by March 18 and back to low by March 26 \u2014 it definitely took a toll.<\/p>\n

In total, two people were killed in avalanches, two others were critically injured, 23 were caught in slides and four others were hospitalized. Additionally, power lines were damaged in five counties, 10 structures were damaged and countless roads were closed.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll these numbers could have been a lot worse,\u201d Rohrig said.<\/p>\n

According to Rohrig, there were more than 1,000 recorded avalanches in just a two-week period and obviously many more that weren\u2019t recorded. But perhaps what stands out even more is the destructive capacity of the slides. Rohrig said there were at least 87 avalanches recorded with a D4 rating or higher \u2014 the second-highest destructive rating. In the eight years leading up to the 2019 cycle, only 24 of that size were recorded in total.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs far as a historic cycle, it really was that,\u201d Rohrig said. \u201cFor much of our staff, we\u2019d never seen anything like it. And most of us don\u2019t think we will again in our careers.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rohrig said the Silent Bob slide itself also helps to shed some light on the historic nature of the cycle.  <\/p>\n

\u201cThe Peak One avalanche, which is near and dear to us here, felt like it was a completely new avalanche path. Amazingly enough, the (Breckenridge) Heritage Alliance found this photograph from 1899 showing that exact same path 120 years ago. That kind of speaks to the frequency of a cycle like this.\u201d<\/p>\n

via:: Sky-Hi News<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A view of the “Silent Bob” avalanche path as seen from the Frisco recpath Thursday, March 5, 2020. Liz Copan \/ ecopan@summitdaily.com FRISCO \u2014 Kreston Rohrig stood gathered among his colleagues at the Colorado Avalanche Information Center last winter, trying to determine just how dangerous conditions in the Summit County backcountry had gotten over the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-21759","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-19 02:01:50","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KRKY Ski Country","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21759","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21759"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21759\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21759"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21759"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21759"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}