calm before the storm

Today was a day for our AST 1 group to get our heads in the snowpack! We started the day getting our hands in the snowpack at 1640M with a quick hand shear test. This produced moderate resistant results on the facets down about 50cm above the melt freeze crust from Feb 3. We then moved to 2200M and did a rutchblock test with the sled on a SE aspect (within some protected trees on a slope of 20 degrees). This produced no results. We then moved to a SE aspect at 2240M just below a wind affected ridge top and we did many compression tests. We had quantifiable easy sudden collapse results in the top 25cm of new storm snow that was sitting on a thin layer of a melt freeze crust. The persistent weak layer that is sitting down 55cm here has facets sitting on top of a 10cm thick melt freeze crust and was producing some inconsistent hard results. I think I will be playing it conservative at tree line and alpine elevations during this upcoming storm cycle that will add extra weight to the already touchy snowpack.