Quick report
- Red Flags
- Collapsing
- Red Flags Comment
- <p>No less than 10 large collapses felt today.</p>
We went out for just a few hours today to check a few different areas and see if we continued to find the weak sugary snow under the 2 feet of new snow. Sure enough. A northwest facing slope that we spent some time on produced numerous large collapses. When I stepped off the machine or my skis I would punch through the new snow and through the underlying facets (sugar snow).
When the snowpack collapses, it's a huge "whoomping" sound. If this is occurring, it means that the loose sugary snow is collapsing under the weight of what's above it. If the slope is steep enough, it will avalanche. We stayed on slopes less than 30 degrees when investigating the northerly aspects.
The thing that's tough about this situation is that not every slope is going to avalanche or have signs of avalanche danger. This means you might get onto a variety of slopes during the day and gain confidence then head to the more northerly facing slopes where you're much more likely to trigger something.
Snowpack
- Instability Comment
- <p>The loose facets now buried are likely to still be active through the weekend.</p> <p>I am kind of thinking that since the new snow has gone through a couple of melt freeze cycles over the last few days it may not become too unstable on Saturday. That said, temperatures will be warm with lots of sun so we always need to be aware of the chance for wet activity after new snow storms.</p>