Quick report
- Red Flags
- Rapid Warming, Poor Snowpack Structure
We started out trip up to the Lambs trailhead around 1pm. The snow at 6200' was boilerplate rain crust from the last storm. Frozen rollerballs were evident along the road but we did not see any signs of any wet loose slides. Up to about 7000' the snow was heavily crusted, although beginning to thaw os south facing aspects. The rain really did a number on the lower elevation snow. Per the avalanche problem comments, we discovered some concerning snowpack dynamics, indicating that the snow beneath the crust formed from the last storm was deeply saturated and, in places, we were seeing deep cracks along the trail resembling glide cracks. Given we were traveling under avalanche terrain, we decided to abort our tour given our concerns about snowpack structure. Bonus red flag: Very fresh mountain lion tracks on the skinner.
Snowpack
- Instability Comment
- <p>Snow was warming quickly this afternoon. On steep (30-ish degree) south facing terrain we discovered what looked very much like glide cracks where water had trickled under the snow and was working its way through the scrub brush. Upon probing with our poles we went through 4-5 cm layer of softened melt/freeze crust on top of a roughly 15 centimeter layer of very stout rain/melt/freeze crust from the last storm. We punched through the crust and discovered a VERY wet layer of unconsolidated snow extending to ground level. </p>