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There has been a report of an inbound slide at Australia’s Hotham Alpine Resort today after 35 centimeters of new snow in 24 hours. The current storm is forecast to dump up to 90 centimetres once the cycle finishes early next week.
Ski patrol attended an inbound avalanche at Mary’s Slide that was said to have a 40 to 50 centimeter crown. No one was caught or injured in the slide.
“An inbound slide occurred within the Mary’s Slide Bowl earlier today with debris traveling toward Swindlers Creek” said Hotham Alpine Resort in a statement. “Hotham Alpine Resort would like to commend Ski Patrol for their quick, skilled response and are grateful that everyone is accounted for and safe. Hotham Ski Patrol regularly performs avalanche control work and mitigation across the resort and has been diligently focused on snow safety efforts, given the snowfall the resort has received over the last 24 hours. Hotham Ski Patrol continuously monitors snow conditions, weather forecasts, and evaluates terrain to the extent possible as conditions change.”
It is not uncommon for Australia to receive a large snow cycle that creates avalanche hazard. In 2017 100cms of snow fell in four days that lead to huge instabilities in Australia mountains. In that cycle two skiers triggered a sizeable avalanche in the Hotham’s slackcountry (above photo).
Thredbo has the most snow in Australia with a 140cm storm total and is reporting fantastic top to bottom conditions. Yesterday’s report stated, “The snow stayed in terrific shape all day long, nice light and dry. As the winds picked up there were nice stashes of wind-blown to lay fresh tracks for the afternoon session.”
