Quick report
- Red Flags
- Poor Snowpack Structure
- Red Flags Comment
- <p>The shallow and weak snow pack is still the main concern. A slight increase in the total snow depth and milder temperatures may have slowed down the faceting, but stability tests are still failing in this weak layer. Winds today were loading the northerly aspects, mainly along higher ridgelines.</p>
On the north slope, the road (Hwy 150) conditions are passable to about the 9,000' elevation or mile marker 39, before things get fairly snow packed with roughly 9" of snow on the road. Recommended that riders unload lower down on the road as places to turn around are very limited. The recent storm has started to smooth-out some of the rough terrain.
This snow pit is fairly representative of higher elevation north facing terrain with weak snow near the ground.
The best riding and turning conditions are found on smooth low angle north facing slopes.
Much of the terrain out there that faces southeast through southwest is still thin and rocky.
Even with this last storm many slopes still do not have the snow coverage or connectivity.
The moderatley strong winds today were blowing snow onto the high elevation start zones on north facing slopes.
Snowpack
- Instability Comment
- <p>In my snow observations today, I continually got columns to fail on weak snow near the ground. This was on slopes that faced the north side of the compass. </p> <p>The wind loading that I observed today was on the higher ridgelines, loading the start zones. Much of this terrain is still difficult to access due to limited snow cover.</p>
Early in the day the snow was cool with powder conditions and observed some overnight surface hoar that developed in protected areas. The sunny aspects became slightly damp and sticky, while the north remained cool with supportable turning.