Wimpy's

We poked and prodded our way up Wimpies. Despite low-coverage conditions and a rain transitioning to rime crust to ~8000', I'd compare the exit to November last year. Southerlies have very low coverage (less than 80cm up to 9.5K). Out of curiosity, as this was my first venture into the park this season, I continually checked depths and did hand pits. The overall structure looked decent. We also chose two upper-elevation slopes to dig full pits on (see attached).  At the facet interface of interest (~25cm on the south half of the compass and ~40 cm on the north half), I found rounding facets that did not propagate on either aspect. That said, the deeper structure on aspects ranging from NW-N-NE has more developed facets that I think will produce avalanches with a significant storm incoming. Less obvious upper-snowpack instabilities exist that are not typical "PWL facet layers," like crusts and recent weaker snow from pulses of precip over the last week. These will also likely produce avalanches with how much incoming snow and wind are en route.