Near Schofield Pass

The danger is easing in this area, but if you find just the wrong spot you can still trigger a Persistent Slab avalanche. In general, the cool, clear weather is faceting the snowpack from both the top down and bottom up. Where the snowpack is deeper than about 18" (45cm) there's still enough "mid-pack" left to act as a slab.

We found around 15-18" of snow near the valley floor that was mostly trap-door facets. As we travelled through the near treeline elevation band to about 11,700 feet, the snowpack depth increased to around 2 feet (~60cm) thick. The snowpack would crack and collapse locally (up to around 10 feet away) in open north and east-facing glades. As we nudged into alpine terrain, we found deeper, very firm drifts that our skis barely left a mark in, mixed with shallower faceted areas with no collapsing. Poking around the margins of the slabs did not produce any cracking.