Northern New Mexico

It remains possible to trigger a persistent slab avalanche on depth hoar or faceted crusts in steep terrain at all elevations. Recent snow and strong winds have built stiffer more cohesive slabs on top of these weak layers. The most dangerous slopes face north and some upper elevation east aspects.  These persistent weak layers are 1 to 3 feet below the surface. Take the time to dig a pit to assess this strong over weak snowpack structure and what the potential consequences would be if you were to trigger an avalanche.  Sticking to lower angeled wind-sheltered terrain will provide better and safer riding options.

As spring begins, you couldn't tell with our snowpack. Facets and depth hoar continue to remain in mid-winter form and have cohesive slabs from recent March snow and strong winds. Extreme winds on Tuesday helped drift and press snow into stiffer cohesive slabs. At upper elevations, you may find a shallow wind slabs on the leeward sides of ridgelines or cross-loaded terrain features, but the main concern continues to be persistent weak layers 1 to 3 feet below the surface. With warming temperatures and our intense sun this time of year, lower elevations especially on the solar aspects may heat up where you find wet snow on the surface. Watch for rollerballs and pinwheels as this an indication that the snow surface is becoming wet. 

At this point, it seems like a broken record, but we've had an incredibly bad setup this year for stability. Unlike our friends to our north, two big storms hit us in October and early November bringing 5 feet of snow. We then went through close to 3 months of drought with limited snow and over this time on mainly northerly aspects above 10,500' the snow formed well-developed facets called depth hoar. It wasn't until the end of January that we started to see storms that helped build slabs over these weak layers.  Although there hasn't been much snow, some storms combined with wind helped build slabs over this very weak and widespread persistent weak layers over the last couple of months. We never had the big storm this year to help "flush" facets or depth hoar but instead saw smaller avalanche cycles with each "big" storm and continued to have prolonged periods of instability.  It's just not a snowpack to trust and with our limited snow coverage, anywhere that looks enticing enough to ski or ride will push you into this poor snowpack structure.

It's been a low snow year with the bulk of moisture coming before November 8th. The prolonged dry period from November through January produced widespread depth hoar on northerly aspects. Smaller storms arrived starting at the end of January along with strong winds and built cohesive slabs on top of widespread weak layers.    (3/21/2025) Photo: Taos Avalanche Center

In travels over the last couple of days, we continue to get cracking and collapsing and easy to moderate results in long column stability tests. Whether it's faceted crusts from the early and late February warm-ups or depth hoar, slabs have continued to build with snow over March combined with strong winds that have only exacerbated this strong over weak poor snowpack structure.    At least for the next couple of days, it's still a shallow mid-winter snowpack (more on that later). 

Below treeline, the snowpack is thin (<1.25 m on most slopes). Most of this snow is found above 10,500' and on northerly aspects. The vast majority of this snow came before November 8th. I'll let that sit in, as this snow has turned into fragile weak 3 to 10 mm depth hoar. As most of our terrain is probably considered below treeline, we've had natural avalanche cycles with each loading event.  Just yesterday we continue to get cracking and collapsing at this elevation. Although I think it's bordering on unlikely to trigger an avalanche at this elevation as we push further away from the last "significant" storm, steep northerly slopes that are exposed to some wind would give me some pause. These weak layers are easy to impact as we continue to swim in depth hoar and almost certainly will be impacted in your travels. 

At upper elevations near and above treeline, recent strong to extreme winds have built cohesive slabs on top of weak layers. The most dangerous slopes lay on the north and east aspects and may be found on cross-loaded near treeline west aspects.  You'll find comfort on harder slabs as they'll be supportable and feel good underfoot, compared to the weak snowpack below treeline, but the real problem lurks deeper down in the snowpack.  Whether it's faceted crusts or depth hoar these weak layers should be obvious to identify in snowpits. As is the case when dealing with hard slabs, it may take hitting the margins of the slab where weak layers are easier to impact. Avalanches at these elevations will be larger and would be large enough to injure or bury you. 

We'll hold onto winter for the next couple of days and you can still find decent "recycled" powder on wind-sheltered north-facing terrain, just bring some fat boards as you'll most likely be riding some depth hoar underneath. Trail heads continue to remain low-tide with lots of rocks and downed trees exposed. A big warm-up starts Sunday with temperatures climbing near 60 F by Tuesday. This combined with superficial refreezes will bring about wet snow avalanche concerns. We'll talk more about that in the coming days. Unfortunately, long-term models are not overly optimistic about snow until April, as storms stay to our north and south.