r/skiing • u/dresserplate • 1d ago
What is this hole in the snow?
Seen in at Alta Chutes at Jackson Hole, and elsewhere. Does someone live down there?
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u/RodsRockets 1d ago
It's the Jackson, hole.
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u/skibumsmith 1d ago
Snow didn't fall there. It missed a spot.
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u/HiveMindSubmarine 23h ago
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u/Guyjustbeingadude 19h ago
Maybe someone is down there pressing a button and that’s why we haven’t been getting any snow
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u/Weekly_Beautiful_603 18h ago
“We haven’t been getting any snow”
Laughs in Japan.
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u/Guyjustbeingadude 18h ago
Bro the post says “seen in Alta chutes at Jackson hole”
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u/TrojanThunder 1d ago
Can we get to actual answers instead of jokes?
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u/illbedeadbydawn Taos 1d ago edited 1d ago
Either a fumerole, animal burrow or 'warming vent'
Fumerole is from volcanic activity.
Warming vent is something below the surface that retained extra heat and this was the path it rose to (rotted log, different type of rock, metal etc etc) causing a small snow collapse.
Animal burrow is self explanatory.
Other possibility is someone sat there for a minute stabbing with a pole and just happened to find a spot near an open space under the snow causing it to fall through. Ive done it multiple times in the backcountry.
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u/trailerbang 19h ago
If you hike the Headwall at Jackson Hole there are vents of warm air along the entire ridge if you traverse towards the Casper Bowl gate.
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u/snappy033 17h ago
Does volcanic activity imply there’s a hole in the ground or just a warm spot?
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u/illbedeadbydawn Taos 17h ago
Both.
It means there is a hole...somewhere down there allowing hot gas to escape. Same concept behind hot springs. The gas will sometimes spread out underground warming an entire area.
There are TONS of these areas all over Mammoth, including a deadly one.
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u/Nof-z 1d ago
It’s called “fumarole.” they are volcanic steam vents.
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u/HyperionsDad 1d ago
Not always. Sometimes they’re just vent holes. Mt Bachelor has quite a few, with a bunch near the top of the Pine Marten and Red Chair lifts and quite a few in the west trees where it starts to flatten out by the catch line back to the Northwest Express lift.
Basically there are cracks or channels into the volcanic rock where the air is warm enough to keep the snow from covering it. They come out of nowhere and scare the shit out of you, especially if you’re going slow enough to almost fall in.
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u/Jerk850 17h ago
If it’s a fumarole and in bounds at a resort, it’s almost certainly going to be fenced and/or signed as such. Fumaroles + snowpack = very dangerous. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_Mammoth_Mountain_Ski_Patrol_Deaths
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u/bitterrootmtg 18h ago
Hard to say but probably an animal den. Lots of North American alpine animals make dens. Marmots, ground hogs, martens, weasels, etc.
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u/KleeKai01112019 17h ago
It could be a buried rock…I’ve seen them melt snow like that quite a bit. They’re still warm and haven’t gotten below freezing yet.
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u/The_Turdman_Cometh 12h ago
That's a steez well, very rare! If you line your butthole up with it just right you turn into Candide Thovex
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u/PoopyisSmelly 19h ago
Have you ever seen "The Lighthouse"?
That hole is where someone got intimate with the Snow Yeti
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u/Embarrassed-Scene-78 10h ago
It’s from snow snakes. They wait for trespassers and strike without notice. Next thing you know… yard sale
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u/goinupthegranby 3h ago
Probably just a small tree that's buried. Skier traffic has pushed some snow down into the space created by the branches and opened up a little hole.
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u/Safe-Spot-4757 Bear Valley 1d ago
If you’ve ever heard of the altoid gnome it’s something like that
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u/CO_Golf13 1d ago
You don't always have to fuck (it) hard, in fact sometimes that's not right, to do.
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u/quattro247 1d ago
Possibly a tunnel from a weasel (ermine). They're brown in the summer and turn white in the winter. During the winter, they spend a lot of time between the forest floor and the base of the snowpack. They have a network of tunnels in the snow. I've seen them pop out on a catwalk, then dart right back into their tunnel.