Observation: Hells Kitchen

Mild morning and warm afternoon up Franklin Basin. Winds were calm gusting to light out of the north. Skies were broken to scattered with a warm sun on us most of the day. Surface snow on solar aspects was warming and becoming moist and sticking to skins and skis by noon (expecting crusts tomorrow), although snow on N and NE slopes seemed to be holding up and staying cool and dry at mid elevations (we made it up to 7900'). In our snow profile, we found an interesting mixed forms/ facet layer (photo) about 40cm down, however we did not get any test results on it other than our shovel shear and did not notice any signs of instability otherwise, but made structure of the snowpack poor in that particular location. We did not observe any signs of wind slabs or wet loose avalanches on our tour and we rated danger as low in the terrain we traveled in. Overall it was a very nice day in the mountains with no signs of instability noted.