Manto nevoso

Two Bowls, South Fork of Eagle River, Chugach State Park

Mary Gianotti/Peter WadsworthChugach State Park
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Weather

Air Temp
33
Cloud Cover
scattered
Wind Loading
previous
Rain Elevation
Not observed
Recent Snowfall
None
Snow Avail For Transport
none

Broken skies, no precipitation, occasional light breeze from the SE

Snowpack

Our focus today was on the sun affect on a primarily winter snowpack. We noticed a 2"-3" sun crust thickest on steep southerly aspects, which softened throughout the day and turned to corn on our ski descent.  We dug several hand pits and two high-elevation pits.  The sun crust was 2" thick and was noticeably thicker on steep southerly slopes (up to 4" thick).  We noted that most snowpack snow grains were rounding. 

We conducted three ECT tests in our higher elevation pits. We got ECTX in two of our tests and one ECTP19 test result at the top of the rounding depth hoar. We have not seen any avalanches on this layer, but it is a concerning test result and something we are monitoring and keeping track of.