Quick report
- Red Flags
- Wind Loading
- Red Flags Comment
- <p>Stability was as close to perfect as snow stability can ever be. There is about 3" of low density new snow for transport in the upper elevations, and with moderate-gusting Northerly winds there's a chance that some leeward slopes will develop some shallow wind slabs. No wind slab had developed when we were at the top of the Gulch at 10am.</p>
We were back at the trail head at 10:30am, so I can't speak with certainty as to what happened with the weather or snow later in the day.
Snowpack
- Instability Comment
- <p>I would expect the new snow to begin sloughing off the melt freeze crust underneath as soon as things heat up. That being said, with the small amount of new snow this should only be an issue if it knocks you off balance in some extreme terrain.</p> <p>I'd also look out for shallow wind slabs on leeward terrain, which would most likely be sensitive on the underlying melt-freeze crust.</p>
I use "powder" only to describe the small amount of new snow that fell while we were climbing. The top of the couloir had about 3" of low density, mid-winter new snow. That amount decreased with elevation down to about .5" at the Tanners Gulch trail head. Underneath the new snow was a thick melt-freeze crust and quite a bit of frozen avy debris, most likely from the past weekend's wet avalanche cycle.