Mount Superior - March 27, 2024

Words by Ben White

I’m working on a photo project and have been trying to get a specific photo all season long. It would be taken from near the top of Mt Superior looking west at Monte Cristo in the morning with no other tracks in it. That means waking up and walking up the most popular skin track in the Wasatch before the sun and competing with other people who want to do the same.

There was fresh snow and a great forecast. Evan, Lolly, Mallory and myself were cruising up the hill trying to get fresh tracks on this thing. Everybody and their mom had the good idea to ski Superior first thing in the morning with fresh snow before it got too warm.

The skin track was competitive but friendly in the dark with headlamps. Anywhere there was a bit of a crux, somebody got passed. I ran into a guy named Rob who I had a few mutual friends with. He was solo and it was nice to make a new friend. My buddy Jon was out too and it was excellent to run into him.

The route we had planned to ski for the photo I was trying to get could be skied with ropes or not. I was casually asking people what their plan was and everybody was saying “Mt Superior” with enthusiasm. Then I saw the dudes with ropes and my heart sank. I really wanted to get that photo for my project but would need some cooperation from them.

They were gunning for the exact thing I wanted to take a photo of, but they had to get to work early. I was bummed. I asked if they would consider skiing the fall line instead of the photo line, or if they wanted to be the ones in the photo but they’d have to wait for the light to be good. They didn’t want to cooperate. Darn. I exchanged numbers with them anyway.

There were still clouds draped around the summits of the Wasatch as everybody collected on the summit of Superior. This would not do for my photo. There were like 40 people on the summit, all pretty stoked. The clouds broke for a moment and the early morning sun popped through and everybody cheered. People were dropping in one by one with their crews of three and four. It seemed like every crew knew one person in every other crew. Carolyn and Charlie high fived Evan and hung out for a bit, then skied down.

The boys with the rope headed off towards Monte Cristo and saw a big cracked cornice they didn’t want to walk over.. They turned back and told me good luck. They then skied the fall line down instead of the photo line. I was relieved that I could still get what I wanted, but felt like a bit of a dick for trying to get them to do what I wanted them to do. I hoped they got to work on time.

We hung out and waited for the clouds to go away. They were mostly gone, but not gone enough to shoot the photo I wanted to get. More and more lemmings poured off the summit down the south face of Superior. It was a great day for it!

A couple of local legends were heading for Monte Cristo to get the line I wanted to get, but the light was a lot better. I coordinated with their dude on Superior who was going to shoot video with a drone. I could shoot photos and get what I wanted in the light I wanted. We kept waiting.

Then Evan pointed out that a decent size chunk of Superior had slid. It wasn’t connected to any tracks and was either triggered by wind loading or by the sun cracking out. The mood immediately changed to sour. Pep and his crew bailed on skiing Monte Cristo, which would have been a similar aspect to what slid.

There were so many lemmings on Superior. A helicopter was immediately flying around, looking in the debris for any signs of people. I got a phonecall from Jon. Charlie and Carolyn were distraught because they didn’t see their friend Evan (who was in my party) skiing down with them. They didn’t know that he was waiting around for photo stuff to happen and called him in as “unaccounted for”. Jon called me up asking if I knew of an Evan in a blue coat. I told him that he was right there with me and Jon relayed that info to the helicopter people. Moments after accounting for Evan, the helicopter came up to the summit of Superior and had a look at us. I took a selfie with Evan and the helicopter in it. Turns out my friend Carson was flying the ship. I texted my mom saying there was an avalanche but we were fine and there wasn’t any evidence that somebody had been buried. She was at Snowbird.

We skied the most conservative route home we could with minimal east facing overhead hazard. Despite the mood being sour, the snow was really excellent. I texted the dudes with the rope to see if they were ok. They got to work on time. Nobody got buried. Everybody was looking out for each other. It was really comforting knowing that overall, the Wasatch ski community has each others’ backs. Plus I got to drink hot cocoa with my mom.