My buddy who is pro level fell into a well five years after a 60" five day storm. No one knew where he went. He used his pole to make space above his head in circles to clear space to breathe. He was 8' feet deep at least. When he finally got air, he climbed out. Took him almost an hour. Everyone had left him not knowing where he was because in trees you often just don't know.
Last year at Alta/Catherine's I was taking the "Easy" way out after during a first tracks bluebird opening Catherines. I missed at turn, went left instead of right and was about to crash into the "top of a pine tree" and realized that tree was probably 20-30 feet tall and all I could see was 5 feet of it. So I just did what I could to stop myself quickly. which was basically falling left. As I stopped after my fall, I was looking for a grip to push up and get out of the drift I was in and realized I could feel nothing under my feet/skis. Just snow over my feet, but nothing under it. I was sitting on the edge of tree well and just simply stopped on the remaining edge of supporting snow. I have no idea how deep the well was. I was already sinking three feet at that point, head and shoulders barely above the snow. I back stroked my way out of it. I'm physically fit and that took a lot of energy to get out of. Maybe 15 minutes. It was horribly exhausting. In hindsight, frightening.
Heck, one day I skied into a groomer drift that I think was 3-4 feet (poor vis couldn't see it when I hit it). I flew forward, My skis got stuck on my fall and I was horizontal facing downward. Just totally jammed into the snow. I could not breathe. Had to pole plant deep to then lift my body out and get my out of the snow. It was only about 3-4 feet of snow.
Pow sounds awesome and it is...but stories like this remind me that we're very fragile when skiing. I'm a dad first and skier second, so I just don't chase deep, unknown, or tree terrain especially alone.
Be safe everyone!