Although winter storms have been relatively weak so far this season, avalanche risks continue to dictate riders’ terrain decisions. The first avalanche in the Salt Lake area was observed on October 28, and since then over 20 avalanches have been reported to the Utah Avalanche Center between the Salt Lake area and the Uintas.

Most public avalanche preparation and training focuses on backcountry hazards. Still, recent events at resorts like Snowbird, Palisades Tahoe and Jackson Hole are a reminder of the risks skiers and snowboarders take regardless of mountain terrain.

Mark Chytka is the avalanche protection supervisor at Deer Valley Resort, where he has been patrolling for 17 years. Chytka’s experience and familiarity with the Deer Valley terrain is a great asset to his ability to assess risk, he says.

A day of avalanche control in Deer Valley begins before sunrise for ski patrollers. A small group arrives an hour before the others to assemble the explosives needed for the control routes. At 6:45 or 7:00 a.m. the entire team comes together and receives a briefing on current threats.

“We meet with the team, distribute all the explosives and give them an overview of the dangers that are out there. And then we distribute it to our mountains where we will carry out the control work,” Chytka said.

Before setting off, team members ensure their safety equipment – ​​beacons, shovels, probes and airbags – is ready. Control work in Deer Valley primarily involves using explosives to trigger and test hotspots on the mountain.

“At the beginning of the season, before we can open the site, we are constantly forecasting all of our paths,” Chytka said.

Terrain shape, snowfall rates and snow layers are all factors in the avalanche risk assessment that Chytka and the avalanche protection team pay attention to.

“To trigger an avalanche you need three ingredients,” Chytka said. “You need a plate, a weak layer and a lying surface. We always have a lying surface above the ground. So we’re looking for the other two.”

Before the mountain is opened and everyone is allowed onto the hill, Chytka and his team assess the structure and thickness of the snow and identify danger spots. They dig a series of snow pits to examine the layers of snowpack and assess the risk. Once this risk is established, explosives technology comes into play.

“Once we clear the area and people start driving up it, we feel a little better in a lot of areas,” Chytka said. “We’re going back more into maintenance mode, where we’re just maintaining the stability that we have and looking for any developing instability further down in the snowpack.”

Skier compaction is a secret weapon in avalanche protection: the more people ski down the slope, the more the snow is compacted to ensure stability.

However, during a major snow event, skier traffic often cannot keep up with the snowfall rate, posing a greater risk to open slopes.

“We are expecting snowfall rates of more than an inch per hour,” Chytka said. “When we see that, we know we have increasing instability out there.”

In addition to heavy snowfall, Chytka is also keeping an eye on wind loading, as wind transports snow to certain areas and it can become difficult to keep up with the combined increase in snowfall.

“Then we will start thinking about closing that site and then coming out the next day and remediing it. But a lot of it is caused by storm cycles,” Chytka said.

Chytka has 17 years of experience and says familiarity is an essential part of proper avalanche control. The most common avalanche hotspots in Deer Valley are in the Daly Bowl and the Daly Chutes. Early in the season, risk is typically high at Lady Morgan and Bald Mountain, although it decreases as the season progresses, Chytka said.

“We look at the terrain and the landform,” Chytka said. “Everything between 35 and 40 degrees is our avalanche angle. 38 degrees is the perfect sweet spot for slab avalanches.”

When it comes to training new employees, Chytka ensures they have the time and space to observe and learn from more experienced patrol officers before they are exposed to avalanche risk.

“Our route leaders are very familiar with the terrain and understand what we are looking for in our mitigation work. We will pair them with a less experienced patrol officer and their job is to pass on their knowledge as they do the enforcement work out there,” Chytka said.

Chytka and his team are actively working to learn the new terrain that is opening up with the Deer Valley expansion project. This involves mapping avalanche paths in the new terrain and identifying known hotspots so they can gain the necessary experience before the mountain opens to the public.

“We identify all the new slide paths in the new terrain and look at slope angle maps and satellite photos and show where we think something will move,” Chytka said. “As soon as we get enough snow here, we’ll go out there and actually start mitigating it and see what we can do out there.”

Deer Valley will open three new chairlifts this season with over 300 acres of skiable terrain, with more to come soon, areas for which Chytka and his team are already busy preparing.

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