Quick report
- Red Flags
- Rapid Warming, Poor Snowpack Structure
- Red Flags Comment
- <p>Wet snow was the main concern (see below). I've included a photo of South Monitor Bowl where you can see the two avalanche problems we have in the same photo. On the far side of the photo, you can see rollerballs from the waning snow surface on the southerly aspect of the bowl. In the foreground, you can see avalanche debris piled up against the trees from the last major avalanche cycle where the northerly aspects of the bowl slid on deeply buried faceted snow (see below). </p>
Photo 1. South Monitor Bowl with wet rollerballs on the far, south facing wall, ski tracks in the middle from a few days ago before everything got sun crusted. Finally, in the foreground, you can see avalanche debris piled up against the trees from the last major avalanche cycle. All the north facing terrain in the bowl seems to have slid but has a bit of newer snow on top. We did not venture into the bowl.
Photo 2. Drainage channels in the previously dry snow from strong warming by the sun these past few days. Much of the south facing slopes are quite soggy and punchy, but the cooler temperatures may have hit the pause button.
Snowpack
- Instability Comment
- <p>Snow does not like rapid change and most of the damage from rapid warming has already occurred these past few days, so after it warms up again after this ever-so-slight cooling will probably not produce as much wet sluffs in the snow surface. A been-there-done-that kind of thing. I included a photo of drainage channels (also called rill marks) on southerly aspects that occurred a couple days ago.</p> <p>The deeply buried faceted layers seem dormant because they are quite well bridged these days and the faceted snow is, in theory, strengthening rapidly because the temperature gradient has been removed by an insulating layer of overlying snow. The slopes that avalanched during the last cycle can be a wild card, though, because they are still thin and therefore remaining weak. And if they happen to have some sort of slab on top, they might be inclined to give one a spanking. The northerly aspect of South Monitor has all avalanched and now has some new, soft snow on top. I was tempted to channel my best Mark White and lay in some powder eights, but after a long season of angst about faceted snow, I just didn't have the courage, or perhaps it was just the fear of embarrassment.</p>
If you like variety in your life, perhaps you'll like variety in your snow surface conditions as well. There's pretty much every kind of snow surface condition with the exception of rain-rime crust. The inch of new snow helped smooth things over a bit and the cooler temperatures hit the pause button on the wet snow on sunny aspects--temporarily. We could still find some scraps of soft, settled snow on northerly aspects but most everything is quite tracked up. First thing in the morning, the southerly facing slopes, which yesterday were just 6 inches of mush, were JUST supportable enough to make turns if you imagined your were 20 pounds lighter than you really are and skied gingerly. But by afternoon, the sun made everything soggy city again and we felt guilty gouging deep ruts in the mush, but hey, it was kinda fun, but don't tell anyone. I'm hoping for a better freeze tonight and we'll try for some pseudo-corn in the morning. Note, we did not see even one person out skiing today--everything was deserted--and for good reason, mostly. Most slopes have a breakable zipper crust from the sun warming, or they are mushy from sun warming, or wind scoured, or well, take your pick. You kind of need to be a glutton for punishment these days unless you're headed to your double-top-secret-decoder-ring stash of settled powder on northerly slopes.