Skyscraper Mountain North

Ascending to the Skyscraper ridge, we encountered mostly dirt and stiff supportable drifts. It was far from consistent, though, occasionally breaking through the surface into knee-deep, weak, faceted snow below. Looking off the ridge, many southerly slopes had been scoured down to ground near the ridge top, or harbored patches of snow. 

On the descent, we found a mix of thick, hard wind slabs, breakable crusts, and hollow, drum-like, semi-supportable snow. Just below the ridgeline, thin, brittle old wind slabs produced hollow, drum-like sounds and could be broken through into weaker snow beneath. Mid-slope conditions were a mixed bag of breakable old wind slabs and crusts, along with wind-buffed, firm surfaces.

We both commented on the eerie sensation of skiing the drum-like snow on the upper slope. Despite the poor structure—weak snow overlain by a relatively harder slab—we observed no obvious signs of instability such as cracking or collapsing. Instead, the slabs either crumbled under our weight or were just supportive enough to ski on.