Rippin the Zip

We found 40 cm of new snow in the trees near Kitwanga today. This snow wasn’t wind affected which it made for soft, fun riding. With considerable avalanche hazard we made sure to avoid steep slopes and convex slopes. Under the new snow we did find the layer of weak, feathery crystals (surface hoar) which has been producing avalanches throughout the Northwest Coastal region, but with low density snow (no slab quality) on top it didn’t produce any results in snowpack testing today. As we travel around the rest of this week we’ll definitely be watching out for stiff, slabby snow underfoot where it would be easy to trigger avalanches on this layer.