Quick report
No red flag signs of instability observed.
Weather
- Cloud Cover
- few
- Wind Loading
- previous
- Rain Elevation
- Not observed
- Recent Snowfall
- NO
- Snow Avail For Transport
- small smounts
We broke our week plus high pressure trend of calm, cold and clear with the appearance of broken clouds. The rest of the trends stayed true with temperatures in the 20s and calm to light SE winds. Another mild and pleasant day to be out in the mountains.
Snowpack
Snow surfaces were largely soft and faceted with easy skinning throughout the tour, except on true leeward ridgelines. The snowpack had a rightside up feel in most locations with ski pole tests. Overall, we experienced soft and pleasant, faceted surfaces for skiing and riding conditions.
While skinning up 4068' Shadyside, we did notice a few old glide cracks that likely formed during the heavy loading and moistening of the snowpack during the last storm. These appeared to be a meter deep in most places and the slabs on either side were demonstrating signs of faceting/loosening (see below). Cornices at ridgetop were firm and extremely challenging to get to budge on test slopes.
We dug test pits on the Women's Run saddle in previously loaded/cross loaded terrain at 3,656' on west aspect with 32* slope angle. The structure in our snowpack was mostly rightside up with a height of snow ranged from 80-122cm deep. Three stability tests at our test location on the Women's Run all got ECTX (even in shallower areas) indicating an overall increasing strength in the snowpack. While the bottom of the snowpack is mostly 2mm facets, they appeared to be rounding.
Avalanche
We did see some old natural avalanche debris in Wimp Bowl, several of the avalanche pathways on the Shadyside of 4068' including on the E. side of the Women's Run saddle. These are all two weeks old at this point.