Aspen

A widespread shed cycle of Loose Wet avalanche occurred throughout the day on south-facing slopes below cliffs, trees, and other thermal bodies. Of the dozens of Loose Wet avalanches only one appeared gouge deeper into the snowpack growing in size (this was the only Loose Wet coded in this observation). We were surprised we did not remotely trigger any avalanches on our ascent when we were getting shooting cracks and collapses propagating hundreds of feet but on our descent we remotely triggered an avalanche from low-angle terrain above a steep avalanche path.

Calm winds, clear skies, and warm temps.

On northeast-facing slopes below 10,000 ft, we found a few inches of new snow above a thin crust, which formed during the warm part of the storm on Thursday afternoon. As we moved higher in elevation, we found a cohesive slab sitting above well-developed, near-surface facets. This layer, the February drought layer, is our biggest layer of concern, especially as we move into the next loading event this coming week. Below a thin, mostly decomposed melt-freeze crust is the January drought layer where the facets are so well developed we can almost call them depth hoar. All the cracking and collapsing we observed failed on one or both of these layers (see snowpack test results in Snowpilot). A D2 avalanche triggered near tree line on a north-facing slope initially failed under the recent storm snow on the February drought layer and stepped down immediately to the January drought layer. In snowpack tests near the tree line on a northwest-facing slope, two extended column tests showed propagation both under the recent storm snow and just below a faceting-melt-freeze crust from our January dry spell on the 5th and 6th taps, the same layers the observed avalanche failed on.