Quick report
- Red Flags
- Heavy Snowfall, Wind Loading
- Red Flags Comment
- <p>Yesterday's wild storm blasted everything with variable wind directions and the morning snowfall with high precipitation intensity had a lot of rime. So the trees at upper elevations have lots of rime and the snow at upper elevations has a graupel layer about 10 inches down with denser, wind blown snow on top. It feels a bit slabby when you push your ski pole in or dig with your hand, but on several hand pits I could not get it to pop out. The dense, rimed snow seems pretty solid with no cracking or sensitivities even on steep break-overs. Our high point was 9,700'. The snow at lower and mid elevations was quite good turning in about 5-9 inches of dense, surfy snow. Upper elevations had some wind damage with drifts and somewhat variable conditions. People were out and we saw a couple other parties up high along the ridges, and we saw some tracks on the northwest shoulders of Gobbler's Knob. No one triggering anything as far as we could see. I would rate the danger as Moderate where we were.</p>
I attached three photos, two because it's such a pretty place and one to show my wife with the riming on the aspen trees at elevations above about 9,000'