Copper

This was an off-duty sunset/moonrise ski. 

I experienced a very small collapse and associated cracking in a stiff, freshly forming wind drift along an upper elevation ridge.

This was a quick tour, no formal obs taken, just moving through terrain and using my hands and eyeballs.

Snow surfaces are generally weak and will be difficult for the incoming snow to bond to. I'm expecting to see a good bit of new/old storm slab activity during the loading event on Monday if storm properties stay as forecast. I observed evidence of  multiple nights of surface hoar formation here, with standing fields of 10-15mm SH growing in shaded, sheltered terrain. This extended all the way to the top of Copper, but was somewhat less pronounced at highway level (not sure if this is just an artifact of the terrain I was traveling through or the actual distribution). On exposed slopes, SH xtals had been knocked down by wind, on solars the xtals had wilted melted into surface crusts. Slopes with a solar tilt have a range of crust+facet combos, including some broadly distributed RadRx (radiation recrystallization) crusts. Slopes that tilt away from the sun have remained dry and crust-free, and some generic FCsf are developing here. There is some great skiing away from the crusts. 

The slab overlying the 2/1 weak layer has gained a good bit of internal strength. Ski pen is decreasing and it is becoming much more difficult to push your pole down to the 2/1 interface. This slab is fairly thick and has a good bit of water in it, avalanches failing on 2/1 are an unnerving proposition even prior to the expected loading on Monday. There is a lot of terrain that I am staying out of due to my unpredictability around the 2/1. I expect we will see some larger, wider persistent slab activity with slides failing on 2/1 during the upcoming storm.