Quick report
- Cracking
- isolated
Rec ski day with ok riding conditions on east aspects near and below treeline. Sunny slopes were dust-on-crust but often supportive, which made for reasonable travel. Easterly slopes skied well but will be problematic once a new slab forms above the faceted snowpack.
We found a previously drifted feature facing east that produced one small slab avalanche and shooting cracks. The slab formed early this week during elevated winds and cross-loaded a rib. The slab was 4-finger hard, 6 inches thick, and extended 15 feet below the feature. Most of the snow in the debris was from entrainment.Weather
- Cloud Cover
- overcast
- Wind Loading
- light
- Recent Snowfall
- trace
- Snow Avail For Transport
- small smounts
Mostly cloudy skies with a few brief periods of sun. Light snowfall throughout the morning and early afternoon amounting to less than an inch. On the snowmo ride home rates increased to S2 as we rode over Ohio Pass and through the Y.
Snowpack
We travelled through slopes that avalanched during the Thanksgiving storm. South and southeast slopes through 11,600 were shallow with melt/freeze crusts up to 3cm thick near the surface with 1-4 inches of dry settled snow from earlier in the week. Once slopes tilted to the east, the snowpack became very weak with fist hard facets top to bottom except for isolated windboard and shallow slabs on drifted features.
Avalanche
- Size
- D1 R1
- Type
- SS
- Aspect
- E
- Trigger
- AS
- Elevation
- 11400 ft
Much of this terrain naturally avalanched during the Thanksgiving cycle.