Bullion Basin

After battling an epic weekend drive up to Crystal, we hustled to Bullion Basin to take a look at how the storm was shaping up before an early exit to get home and forecast.

Generally speaking, dust on crust conditions existed, with deeper areas of dust reaching 10". We were definitely feeling the underlying crust and riding it, but overall, fun skiing was had and conditions have improved remarkably compared to what we experienced a few basins over on Friday.

The ridgeline between Bullion Peak and Crown Point is developing its usual cornice line, and we observed actively blowing snow due to westerly winds. The skin track along the ridge had drifted in due to snow transport, and visual clues such as fresh drifts, new cornices development, and textured surfaces were spotted near and far. Kicking some wind pillows and small cornices, I was able to get some cracking and soft blocks of snow to fail. Handpits were unremarkable along the approach since the snow was low-density.

On our exit, the snow was noticeably heavier as we descended. 

Was able to get some surface cracking in wind-loaded locations. Pushed snow on steeper slopes that ran as if it were a loose, but may have failed in very soft blocks. Hard to call them real avalanches.

What a difference a few days make. On average we found ~25cm of low-density new snow moderately well bonded to the 12/7 interface. This crust varied in thickness between northerly and southerly aspects, but wasn't particularly stout or frozen. Below it, moist snow existed before transitioning to well-settled drier snow.  Overall, the snowpack is right-side-up, but the storm snow did fail easily during small column tests, albeit subtly. The majority of these instabilities will likely settle out with time and were not a concern where we traveled today. 

The height of snow varies between north and south aspects after the southerlies got baked in last week's warm weather. I measured 137cm in a pit N 5800' and 114cm in a pit SW 6300'. Despite this difference, from the 12/7 interface up, the snowpack was identical.

HS in the meadow of Bullion was ~110cm.