Entiat Sno-Park- Shady Pass, Big hill

It was a beautiful, calm day to explore terrain we seldom visit. Weak surfaces and crusts abound. Otherwise, the snowpack was relatively strong with decent coverage for this location and time of year. No immediate concerns for avalanches.

No signs of instability

Overall, coverage is decent with snow low in the valleys and on many sun-exposed slopes. Being so far east, snow heights were not as shallow as we expected. Moving forward, the most likely layer of concern will be the current surface... whenever it gets buried.

Surfaces: Widespread faceting on and just below the surface. Open, steep, sun-exposed E-S-W had a thin 1-2cm crust on the surface with underlying facets. Other slopes remain dry with surface hoar resting on facets. Surface hoar was on many shaded slopes, but it wasn't extraordinary or overly large. We didn't find it on sun-exposed slopes. 

Snow heights:

4,800ft: 90cm with a crust ↓30cm

6,440ft, ESE: 160cm

6,800ft ridge: 140-160cm, relative to previous wind scouring/loading

 

A profile on ESE, 6,440ft on Big Hill. HS 160cm, Boot Pen 40cm (see profile graph)

The lack of significant crusts or weak layers was notable.

Tests: Shovel tilt test- easy, sudden, ↓10cm on near surface facets (1.5mm).  No recordable results in compression tests. CTN

Notable layers:

1-20cm: Near-surface facets  (1.0mm, 1.5mm in the top 10cm)

Three faint crusts ↓60cm, ↓75cm, ↓95cm. The top 2 were barely perceptible. likely mid-Dec through Solstice

96-100cm: Facetting melt-forms, 1-2mm.

150-160cm: Weak layer on the ground under notably stronger snow. only felt with prob, did not dig to here.