Quick report
Travelled to a zone around 8500ft look at snowpack with more wind deposition under Peak 2. Dug 2 snow pits. In both the N and SE aspects that I looked at, the snowpack was significantly deeper than just a 1000ft lower on the mountain. The SE facing wind loaded slope was 250cm deep with roughly 80cm of faceted snow at the bottom of the snowpack. The N facing wind loaded slope was 200cm deep with the bottom 90cm of the snowpack faceted. In both pits, Deep Tap Tests showed signs of instability in the Depth hoar layer. The N facing pit showed larger temperature variation from top to bottom, but both pits had frozen ground temps. While it is getting harder to impact this layer in areas with the deeper snowpack, the depth hoar is still preserved and reactive!