Independence Mine lot>Birthday Pass

Today definitely felt like winter, with cooler temps and wicked winds.  Spring has halted for the moment. Snow surfaces were mostly firm, with various crusts and a dusting of new snow from overnight.  Despite winds honking with SE gusts of 50-60 mph for nearly 5 hours, little snow is available for transport, which limited the size of wind slab formation today.  We tried to ski cut and stomp on numerous slopes in exposed areas near ridgelines and only got small shallow pockets to move. New wind slabs that formed today were at most 5 inches thick and more like 1 inch thick at 3500'. Due to the intensity of the wind, we didn't spend much time at Birthday Pass, rapidly buckled boots, ripped skins and descended. A strong headwind made for a lot of work getting back to the parking lot. Today's wind was unusual in its strength and duration, from 3000' up to 5000' and never let up. Conditions are pretty dire out there with firm snow surfaces, old debris, and south aspects melting out rapidly despite cooler temperatures this week. Others must have gotten the memo about conditions, with one solo party of Nordic skiers in the parking lot and not another soul. 

No recent avalanches were observed today. We had minor thin cracking underfoot, approximately 1-4" thick and 3-5' long, from shallow wind slabs forming throughout the day. No whumping was experienced today.