Ten Lakes. Northern Whitefish

Today we went into the northern Whitefish Range to investigate a crown of a recently triggered avalanche.

• This avalanche failed on an east-facing slope at 7600 feet. 
• It failed on a layer of large, weak grains (depth hoar) near the ground. (See more in video or avalanche tab)
• We found 6 inches of new/recent snow. We observed no signs of recent wind transport.
• We experienced mostly cloudy skies until 4 pm, which kept surface snow cold. 

Crown profile at 7500 ft. 120 HS. The basal structure consists of large-grained depth hoar. This weak snow began to facet in November, but continued to weaken throughout the season due to a shallow snowpack structure and strong temperature gradients. A similar snowpack structure has been observed in a number of snowpits in the northern part of the Whitefish Range.