Quick report
- Red Flags Comment
- <p>Saw no cracking, felt no whumphs, jumped on a few 30+ degree slopes, found nothing reactive. Had some gear failure before I could dig a pit, switched focus to getting back out.</p>
Photo shows the omnipresent thin crust on the north-facing slopes.
Snowpack
- Instability Comment
- <p>The weak snow is still there. Not too hard to push a pole to the ground. Equipment failure caused a fall, and getting back to vertical while laying in three feet of sugar was a challenge!</p>
Sastrugi along the ridgeline at 9,800 feet that bossed us around a bit as we headed toward the goods. In north-facing trees between 9,500 and 8,700 feet, easy surfing on small loose recrystalized grains. A thin crust almost everywhere, but you couldn't feel it on the turns. Some of the skintrack was wallowville, but generally easy going. North facing was mostly dried out facets that will likely create our next weak layer.