Quick report
- Aspect
- Southwest
- Elevation
- 2652 m
The warm temperatures and moist cloudy nights are keeping the shallow snowpack from rapidly rotting or becoming faceted or sugary and weak. The weakest snow is just below the prominent M/F-crust at the Oct/Nov interface. Heavily rimed dense snow offered us a chance to experience maritime-like snow conditions, otherwise known as Sierra Cement....
The Grand Cornice on Cornice Ridge is already growing, presenting an obvious example of a wind feature to avoid in steep terrain.
Rimed trees on the ridge reminded me of skiing on the east coast, but then rime isn't all that uncommon around here.... Shows why yesterday's moist snow stuck so well to the rocks. I dropped a ways down into Upper Cottonwood in the Mount Naomi Wilderness on a west-southwest facing slope and found thin but workable conditions on a slope with no October snow as a base.
Snowpack
- Instability Comment
- <p>Felt like I probably could have triggered wet avalanches involving the moist fresh snow in steep terrain especially as the day warmed and cloud cover began to break up. This could be a problem again tomorrow with even warmer temperatures forecast.</p> <p>I'm still finding weak faceted snow near the October/November interface. This layer was still unreactive even with additional weight today and felt a bit moist. Gotta imagine some slopes in the zone to be suspect.. Warm temps and cloud cover are helping to keep the shallow snowpack from rotting out and becoming completely plagued by facets.</p>
Heavily rimed dense snow, well pasted onto rocks..