Johnson Canyon

Toured all aspects in Johnson Canyon today. West aspects were wind sculpted though soft. At lower elevations where there was minimal snow before this storm, open water and manzanita collapse were the main issues. There had been a natural cornice collapse and wind slab avalanche sometime during the storm yesterday, on the east side of the central ridge that usually loads. But overall the snowpack today felt mostly stable, with no cracking in the new snow, and stomping on/dropping cornices on north and east facing wind slabs did not generate any releases or cracks. The one exception was a whumpf that occurred on north facing terrain behind Johnson Canyon around 7100 feet, when I posthold up to my waist during a transition and stepped through the old surface layer. In that area there was about a meter of new storm snow, with ankle to boot deep ski penetration, and knee to waist deep boot penetration, so it was pretty hard to impact the buried weak layer.

Quick report