Quick report
We did not observe cracking or collapsing, or any natural or human triggered avalanches today. However, we did find the same weak snowpack structure and layers of concern we've been concerned about for the past week plus. These weak layers produced many easy force propagation results in snowpack tests, and failed below slabs a shallow as 6 inches thick. Where these slabs are thicker and stiffer, the ensuing slide would be much larger.
Weather
- Cloud Cover
- few
- Wind Loading
- none
- Recent Snowfall
- 0
- Snow Avail For Transport
- moderate amounts
Above freezing and warm air temperatures in the sun. Scattered cloud cover and good visibility into surrounding mountain terrain. Weather stations showed above freezing temperatures last night at 5,400 feet, but clear skies at night is promoting strong radiational cooling and surface re-freezing. Shady slopes with a thin crust did not soften despite today's warmup.
Snowpack
Snow surface conditions varied by aspect and elevation but in general were supportive on skis and had a thick to thin crust. Sunny south aspects had soft wet snow surfaces at mid day but still shallow (<10cm) ski penetration from what we observed. We found a similar overall snowpack structure in two different pit locations, nearby at same elevation of 6100 feet but West and Northwest aspects. We observed buried surface hoar from 1/28, down about 15cm, varied in size and distribution.
In addition to today's snowpilot graphs, we conducted a 3rd pit near ridgetop at 6500 feet on a Southeast aspect: ECTN 14 down 15cm on small faceted grains (0.5 -1.0mm) on top of the 1/14 crust. At this location, the 1/14 crust was more broken down, decomposed, than compared to our other pit locations. One notable difference at this location was the presence of moist snow in the top 15cm to the top of the 1/14 crust and did not find buried 1/28 surface hoar. Dry snow existed below the 1/14 crust, within small faceted grains.
Avalanche
None observed