Quick report
- Red Flags
- Poor Snowpack Structure
Bluebird day- no clouds or wind. Snow surface is soft on sheltered N aspects and warm solars, otherwise crusty or icy. No pow to be found but the skiing is fast and fun, as if the whole range got groomed.
Not sure whether this has already been reported, but we also spotted a massive crown on the NE aspect of White Baldy. Incredibly rough estimates- it appeared to break >1000' wide and ran at least 1000', with a depth of 6-12'. Photo below.
Snowpack
- Instability Comment
- <p>We got an ECTP23 (snow profile below) on a N-facing slope at 8500', HS 140cm, showing that the weak layer can still be triggered by skiers in spots shallow enough. This seems to be more of an issue from 8000'-9000' where the snowpack is a bit shallower but still has facets underneath. Given the inherent spatial variability of snowpack depth, it seems prudent to stay off steep N-facing slopes for at least another week or two, giving the facets time to round now that they're buried deep enough. Another snowpit at 9900' showed a much more well-bonded layer of facets, only 1F hard at the weakest. We weren't able to do a PST or deep tap test on this layer due to the depth of snow and time constraints, but given that this layer was much harder than the same facets at 8500' (1F vs 4F), I'd imagine higher elevation, deep snowpack areas are close to rounding their facets.</p>