[MCR] Rockies: Bow Hut day trip

Well, the change that was in the wind has certainly arrived in the immediate environs of the Bow Hut.

Our ACC Calgary AST2 course went for a day trip to the Bow Hut today. By mid morning the west winds had already begun to pick up to moderate and light snow was falling at a rate of less than a centimeter an hour. At noon we ran into Nick’s group from Yamnuska descending from the hut and he mentioned that he felt soft slabs were already beginning to form.

We could see the snow starting to be redistributed in the rocks above and we decided to run up and down to the hut and see how good a track we could set and how safe we could be. We also felt the soft slab formation and a few isolated small features in the immediate lee of the wind were definitely beginning to behave like slabs. The final slope below the hut had some thin 10 to 15cm soft slabs that sheared very easily in isolated locations. We had already had the discussion that at the first sign of this becoming any thicker or more widespread we would just turn tail and run. We were doing pretty constant hand shears and pole tests to make sure we weren’t fooling ourselves. Conditions remained manageable and we reached the hut at our turn around time.

In the short time that it took us to have a snack and remove our skins the winds continued to accelerate and the precipitation rate was now a solid 1cm per hour. Brief intense gusts were now really beginning to move snow around. The headwall was now sluffing and we beat a hasty retreat with our group spaced out. The soft slabs were becoming more pronounced and more widespread but we were now out of harm’s way. We suspected that by morning the slope below the hut may even be a concern.

The large open slope directly above the entrance into the canyon (as you come down from the hut) was also distinctly different from the morning and we felt that by Saturday morning this would also be a more significant consideration. We felt it odd that even when we were breaking trail in untracked snow that we didn’t have any whumpfing today. Didn’t need it to tell us that the hazard was rising. We had far too many other indicators. Fortunately we made it in and out before things really started to get spooky.

As an aside, the creek in the canyon has a large number of open holes and it just doesn’t seem as well filled in as normal. The winds in the canyon were calm in the morning but had started to drift snow when we made our way out. The lake also had a “slushing event” (common during wind and snow events) and there was open water about 15cm below the surface snow. Managed to keep our skins and feet dry but a few unlucky “soles” hiking along were obviously not so lucky!

It was heartening to see that Parks had bumped the hazard to High/Considerable/Moderate for Saturday. Sure felt that things were heading that way to the group and me.

Cyril Shokoples MG
RescueDynamics.com
ACC AST2 Crew



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