Quick report
Spend two field days this weekend looking at the existing snow surface ahead of - hopefully - new snow early this week. There is widespread variability of the snow surface with some weak/faceted snow that is not widespread but spatially-variable. What I was finding:
- weak facets on slopes facing northwest through northeast (and some east aspects as well) above 8,500';
- wind, sun, and temperature crusts with a thin layer of facets on some of these crusts;
- a snowpack that is mostly faceted to the ground in thinner snowpack areas (especially on slopes that slide during the late December avalanche cycle).
Overall this will mean that folks entering avalanche terrain over the next few days will need to continually assess each slope looking for weak snow underneath any new storm or wind-blown snow.
Snowpack
The 5-10 cms of snow from Wednesday has either been wind-damaged, sun or heat-affected, or has turned into weak facets on sheltered slopes > 8,500' facing northwest through east. There is widespread variability on the existing snow surface and it will complicate avalanche danger if snow/water amounts come in on the high-end.
I did find some pockets of recent wind drifts but they weren't very reactive.
The increasingly strong and swirling winds in exposed terrain in the alpine seems to have destroyed surface hoar that I and some others were finding on Saturday.