Quick report
- Collapsing
- isolated
We thought we were in a different region with a bluebird pow day today! We had a lazy start and didn't start skinning until around 1215. Although the temperature stayed at or below freezing, the sun had warmed the roughly 4" of new snow at 4400' enough to cause skin glopping in solar areas. By the end of the day (1730) all areas with prolonged solar exposure below roughly 5500' had developed a sun crust as clouds rolled in and temperatures began to fall. I expect areas that developed this sun crust to have particularly active sluffing with the forecasted snowfall in the next couple days. --New snow totals were between 4" and 6" with higher totals at upper elevations. --We observed an intermittent and gusty, generally SW-W wind blowing and transporting snow at summits and ridgelines throughout the day. --Felt a few collapses, with one larger audible one while ascending a S ridge around 6300'. --Observed wind loading and wind affected snow throughout the tour, with loading generally left over from last week's strong NE wind event, and cornice formation in unusual areas. --New snow was fluffy and skied phenomenally. Felt two small collapses and one audible bigger collapse while ascending a south facing ridge between 6200-6500'.
Weather
- Air Temp
- 20-32
- Cloud Cover
- scattered
- Rain Elevation
- N/A
- Recent Snowfall
- 4-6"
- Snow Avail For Transport
- moderate amounts
Mostly clear skies changed to broken, then overcast by sunset. Snow in areas with solar exposure developed a sun crust when clouds rolled in. Temperatures remained below freezing. Winds were intermittent and breezy at lower and middle elevations, with occasional gusts from unexpected directions. Winds were SW-W, moderate, and sustained at ridgeline throughout the day. We observed moderate blowing snow on ridges and summits.
Snowpack
Dug a pit on a NE aspect near the top of our line around 6950' to look for persistent weak layers and check for propagation. Upon digging, we realized our pit site was too close to ridge line, as there was a big old wind slab under the recent snow -- would not extrapolate too much from our pit data. We didn't spend too much time, but did identify a weak layer of 1.0 mm rounding facets underneath an old, healed wind slab (rounds) 65cm under the surface of the snow. Both the ECT and CT failed on that layer with moderate force (ECTN16, CT15 PC).