Quick report
- Cracking
- specific
Recent winds have created a variety of wind-loaded surfaces on Nason Ridge and in the Chiwaukum, with winds blowing from east and west in the last several days. Gusts were hardly above light today, but there's plenty of snow available for transport at all elevations. We had some clean, propagating cracks BTL in the Henry's clear-cuts in non-wind affected, northerly terrain at 4300'. Cracks propagated to 15' in moderate rollover terrain, and buried surface hoar over the JDL was the weak layer. We had a quick dig at 5500' on northwest: CT 4, CT 11, CT 14 @20cm down @ 30cm down, @ 50cm down (JDL). ECTN 9 and ECTN 11 with fractures at the layers @20cm and 30cm. Near surface facetsand the mid-storm density change (1/31) were the culprits. We had a PST 80/100 end above the JDL, and 20/100 below the JDL on facets. We saw widespread weakening snow in the top 30 cm, including small surface hoar and near surface facets.
Avalanche
We saw several natural D2s in the Chiwaukum: a fresh (11 Feb) L-N-R1-D2 on west around 6000' near Middle Chiwaukum, an older HD-N-R1-D2 from last week off the North Chiwaukum ridgeline at 6500' on west. Even with cold temps, L-N-R1-D1 were common in the southerly gullies off of Rock Mountain and Nason Ridge.