Vail & Summit County

Clear skies and temperatures in the 20s with light winds.

The height of the snow was only about 60 centimeters total. I got a failure upon isolation in an Extended Column Test below the most recently drifted slab in a really soft layer of facets about 15cm from the surface. However, the avalanche didn't break here. It broke on a crust-facet layer, another 5 to 10 cm down. In some places, this looked different than the December 18 crust, but in other places, it had the characteristic pebbles and dirt in it. The slide broke here and then also stepped down in most places to run on a strong crust layer that's on the ground, about 25cm thick. I also got a propagating result after one tap from the elbow at the layer where the slide broke. Only the top 5 to 10cm of snow got wet or moist yesterday and formed a thin zipper crust on the surface this morning. The snowpack here was dry otherwise.