Observation: Chicken Sh#! Ridge

Today we headed out to see how the new snow was bonding to the old snow surface, and how the two different PWL layers were looking within the snowpack. As we climbed, temperatures were warm and we found that initially the graupel seemed to be bonding well to the damp snow surface. Even on steeper slopes at low elevations the graupel wasn't rolling or obviously pooling. As the day went on, the cold front moved in and the precipitation transitioned from just graupel to a mix of graupel and precipitation particles. On our way down there seemed to be a bit of sluffing within the new snow mix.

We dug an initial pit on an East facing aspect near 9000' feet on Chicken Shit Ridge. We found both persistent weak layers, the upper of the two about 10-12" down, forming at the end of January. The secondary PWL down at the base of the snowpack. They were both obvious within the pit wall, but did not give us any results in stability tests.

We wanted to look at the snowpack on a previously avalanched slope (repeater). The picture below shows a northeast-facing Day's Draw at 9890' that avalanched around Christmas. It's very weak and shallow, and avalanches will be a problem with a slab. You can see the old crown in the photo on the right.

The old snow surface was damp and isothermal at low elevations. As we moved up in elevation, the snow surface beneath the new graupel finally transitioned to dry around 8,800'. Even at 8,900', where we dug a pit, we noticed a thin damp surface that will likely freeze with the temperature drop.