Quick report
The surface snow (top ~50 cms) has very little cohesion at low elevations (<5000'), but cohesion grew significantly as we ascended. Above 6000' surface snow was much denser and extremely cohesive and repeatedly failed in sizable blocks on uptrack hand shears. We observed no shooting cracks or whumpfs in the snow. We dug down to the solstice crust at 6500' on a west aspect below the summit of Platinum Peak. We took a look at present layers but did not perform a hand shear test. The column failed approx. 45cm below the snow surface with a planar fracture on a density change and it failed again a few cms above the Solstice crust with a planar fracture. Snow surface - 130cm, Failure #1 - 90cm, Failure #2- ~30cm.
Avalanche
We observed (from afar) an avalanche crown on the West ridge of Bullion peak (N aspect, elevation ~6200) . We spotted the crown around maybe 9am this morning, so the avalanche is presumably natural and likely large.