Quick report
- Cracking
- isolated
Surprise! A few inches of new snow and increasing winds turned into nearly a foot at 5000 feet and nearly calm conditions. While the new snow was a nice alternative to the slick, dust-on-crust I was expecting, the crust was still a major player in terms of avalanche hazard. Loose snow and soft slab avalanches were easy to trigger on any slope approaching 40 degrees, entraining moderate amounts of snow and running harder and farther than expected. Low to moderately angled slopes provided the best riding conditions. No wind transport was observed, but any wind will easily drift the new snow and should form reactive wind slabs. Would suspect avalanche danger was a notch higher at upper elevations with long, fall line slopes producing loose snow avalanches to D2 - or maybe there were actually wind slabs up there?
Localized cracking in the new snow. Hand shears and other tests didn't produce results as the slab was generally too soft.
Weather
- Cloud Cover
- obscured
- Wind Loading
- none
- Rain Elevation
- 2500
- Recent Snowfall
- 30
- Snow Avail For Transport
- moderate amounts
Moderate snowfall on a late-morning drive up to Heather Meadows that slowly increased through the afternoon. Winds were light at best with no wind transport observed. Snow level dropped through the afternoon.
Snowpack
Up to 30cm F > 4F new snow over a thin melt-freeze crust that formed and was buried on all aspects on 3/28. Crust was stronger on solars, but test profiles on northerly and southerly aspects were quite similar in structure. Suspect crust is present on solars at upper elevations, but may disappear with elevation gain on northerlies. Below the uppermost crust, another 10cm of 1F rounded grains, and then a mix of knife-hard crusts, melt forms, and pencil-hard moist rounded grains. Stability tests yielded hard, very resistant results at various crust interfaces. Tilts (and ski cuts) were the best way to investigate the new-old interface.
Avalanche
Was able to trigger numerous dry loose to D1.5 and a few very soft, small slabs with ski cuts, or simply pushing snow onto a steep slope from the ridge above. Any snow that got moving was entraining even more snow and running fast and packing a punch by the time they got to the flats. Slabs were 25-30cm deep but not stiff enough to propagate very far. A few naturals on steep slopes in Swift Creek triggered by snow shedding from trees.