Quick report
- Aspect
- East
- Red Flags
- Heavy Snowfall, Collapsing, Poor Snowpack Structure
- Elevation
- 1920 m
- Slope Angle
- 21°
I found a reactive buried weak layer of surface hoar and small faceted grains about 2' under the powdery snow surface.
I went back to Hattie's yesterday (1/25/17) and noticed that much of the lower south side (northeast facing) of the bowl had naturally cracked and collapsed, likely on Monday or Monday night. The spider web cracks spread across the slope where is had failed. The only reason it didn't avalanche was the slope angle (about 32 degrees).
We ski tested a few different areas of the bowl and did not produce any avalanches or observe any red flags other than the existence of the persistent weak layer made up of surface hoar and small faceted crystals.
Snowpack
- Instability Comment
- <p>obvious weak layer of surface hoar and small faceted grains easily visible in snowpit wall. I was able to initiate full propagation failures on this layer 70 cms below the powdery snow surface.</p> <p>Wind slabs from Monday's storm are buried and hidden by several inches of fresh light snow. </p> <p>Calm conditions now, but lots of very light powder on the surface will be easily drifted into fresh wind slabs as winds increase.</p>
Difficult trail breaking, with deep, somewhat inverted new snow