Quick report
About 3" of new snow since yesterday morning. Although it's been windy, sheltered areas and middle elevations harbor soft surface snow. A soft crust exists on solars under the new snow and shallowly buried windboard exists in many exposed areas. While there was notable wind transport happening today, there was minimal wind slab development below 9800 feet and nothing reactive. It would not surprise me, though, if you could find very small reactive wind slabs above 10k in exposed areas and on ridges.
Dug at 9450 on a northwest aspect and did 2 ECTs, HS 62" (160 cm): ECTN4 x2 down 7" (18cm) and ECTN17x2 down 12" (30cm). ECTP29 down 28" (70 cms) on crust/facet interface (possible 1/31 facets), ECTX on the second test.
No cracking or collapsing where I traveled.
Weather
- Cloud Cover
- overcast
- Wind Loading
- moderate
- Recent Snowfall
- 7
- Snow Avail For Transport
- moderate amounts
Started the day with heavy snow (s2-3) but it quickly tapered off to partly sunny skies by 11am. Light NW/W wind gusting to moderate on ridges, notable snow transport in exposed areas and on ridges at upper elevations.
Snowpack
Up to the weather station to clear the board: 23" of snow and 4.2" SWE. (Last cleared 2/5)