Quick report
- Red Flags
- Recent Avalanches
- Red Flags Comment
- <p>We saw some recent wet loose from today and some larger releases from yesterday.</p>
We moved as two groups trying to gather a larger, spatially variable set of data points targeting the recently developed near surface facets and seeing if water had moved down through the snowpack.
Photo 1: White Pine TH tree wells around aspens. Isothermal snowpack in surrouding areas and lower meadow adjacent to trail.
Photo 2: ECTP17 on 10mm SH at 8500'
Photo 3: Buried 10mm SH found near creek at this elevation
Photo 4: CT results on 5mm SH at 8500'
Photo 5: Buried 5mm SH found in sheltered meadow with clear view of sky.
Photo 6: Side by side tests across meadow. Initiation, but no propagation.
Photo 7: Roller balls on lower West Scotties.
Snowpack
- Instability Comment
- <p>This is the primary problem where we traveled today and we specifically wanted to know more about the snow at low elevation. The potential for deeper gouguing wet loose is possible on slopes >30 degrees and this was evidenced by some small slope testing. </p> <p>This problem is trending stubborn to unreactive at mid elevation in this drainage out of the influence of wind. We targeted the 1/31 interface of near surface facets, and in some isolated locations, surface hoar. We performed over a dozen snowpack tests on W-NW facing terrain between 8,000' -8,500'. Numerous CT results showed initiation, but many were Restent Planar, with only a few Sudden Collapse on the aforementioned surface hoar (5mm-10mm). ECTN results on majority pits, with one propagating result on 10mm surface hoar.</p> <p> </p> <p>The upper 25cm of snowpack has become moist, with the rest of the snowpack still dry at 8,500. Mid pack is stout 1F-P hard rounded grains. Basal facets are 2-3mm but showing signs of rounding and did not prove reactive in tests.</p> <p> </p> <p>We did get visual of the upper white pine drainage at a break in the clouds around 330pm. The Birthday Chutes were looking like they had been crossloaded. The starting zone of the Tri Chutes is stripped bare from so many days of intense SW-W winds.</p>
Mixed bag of wet surface conditions in many locales at low elevation. Snowpack below 8000' is isothermal. Foot penetration of 60cm. Above 8500' the new snow was supportable and not too sticky. That being said, we stuck to the road for the ascent/descent to avoid trenching into the unconsolidated mank beneath the new snow.