Quick report
- Red Flags
- Poor Snowpack Structure
- Red Flags Comment
- <p>I'm sure some avalanches were out there somewhere, but given the very low vis, we certainly couldn't see them. Snowfall had and continued to occur, but given the low density, I can't really call it "heavy." No wind effects on the pole line, and very little at the pass or the top of Cardiff fork. The biggest concern we saw was the snowpack structure (see photos below).</p>
NW aspect just shy of 10,000ft, with snow depth between 50 and 70cm depending on rocks at the surface. 15cm of new snow, F hardness at the surface, trending to F+/4F on the way down. Below the new snow was crust sandwich (crusts each a couple cm thick indicated by the red lines) with facets in between. Below the lower crust was facets to the dirt. Not an inspiring structure. Calling it moderate hazard in our location, but I have no doubt there was and will continue to be considerable hazard any place wind loading was happening.
Beneath Cardiff Peak on an E aspect at 10,000ft we generally found new snow on an impressively thick and hard crust, facets below. Pictured here is about 12-15cm of stout supportable P hard crust.
Spatial variability was also in full effect. Within 2 meters of the super stout and supportable crust pictured above, this small block of soft slab peeled off in front of my ski. It was resting atop a crust so thin and weak it was barely differntiable from the underlying facets. Quite a big change between the tips and tails of my skis.
Snowpack
About 15cm of new snow, mostly unconsolidated, with moments of soft storm slab at F+/4F hardness.