Quick report
- Red Flags
- Rapid Warming, Poor Snowpack Structure
- Red Flags Comment
- <p>Poor snowpack structure continues to be in place, and the depth of these areas is still only 40 inches at it's deepest with HS much less on every aspect but the north. </p>
Snowpack
- Instability Comment
- <p>Steep rocky terrain with thin snowpack areas are still suspect. Overall the snowpack appears to be healing in areas with a meter or more, and this latest event appeared to be not supplying enough SWE to activate the buried weak layers. In the long run, this addtional blanket of insulation and minimal weight may be slowly helping move things towards better stability. That being said, there are definitely some suspect areas still lingering. </p> <p>Warm sunny weather today and more tomorrow should help keep this issue alive on the southerly aspects. </p>
Snow was getting damp on ESE by 1000 and this effect traveled quickly around the southern end of the compass. By 1100 SE aspects were wet. Breakable crust will be in place on the lower half of the compass on Wednesday. Travel today was only up to 9600, and it was distinctly different that the previous day when all travel until exiting was above this altitude. Snow conditions were cold powder snow, but the settlement that has occurred since Sunday had made the new snow much more dense and actually the riding was slower and not as good. Obviously the higher elevations would have been different. Steep lines were ridden on north and northeasterly facing aspects.