Persisting In Crown

Another Spring-Adjacent day without too much change (ie awesome again!). High temp of -2 up on our ridge, calm to light breeze, some sun heat, but not baking. We sledded up Crown Mountain and investigated the snowpack on a gladed North aspect near ridgetop at 2150 m. The full snowpack depth (HS) was 170 cm, with 70 cm of February and March’s consolidating snow on top of the ‘January drought’ layer, which in this location is 30 cm or so of weak unconsolidated facet crystals. We had a test failure on this layer (ECTP 30, down 70 on SH/FC), which confirmed our caution of high dry north aspects, particularly where the layer is less than a metre deep, and where (being north) there is no thick stabilising sun-crust. Access is lil’ muddy and lil’ icy, but manageable as far as the big slide path off the North end of Erickson Ridge … it has run and now blocks the forest road (impressively! :-).