South Fork of Eagle River

We headed up the ridge east of North Bowl in the South Fork of Eagle River to see what conditions were like after the recent wind and snow events.   Snow depths ranged from 2" of new snow to up to 3' in wind deposited zones such as gullies and high alpine bowls. There was a surface crust from the rain event over the weekend that had crept up to 2,500'. Snow surfaces at higher elevations were variable- from supportable wind board to a punchy grabby breakable "wind skin" layer.   Underneath the two inches of fresh snow, we consistently observed hard wind packed snow over weak, faceted snow. In more shallow sections of the snow coverage we found one wind affected layer over facets.  In other deeper snowpack zones we found two wind slab layers with two significant facet layers- one mid snowpack and one at the base of the snowpack. The facets at the base of the snowpack were larger with visible striations while the facets in the middle of the snowpack were smaller in size.  We were also able to find patches of depth hoar in some of our handpits. 

We dug two snow pits and found propagating test results (ECTP22 and ECTP28) on the layer of facets beneath the upper wind-affected snow layer, roughly 1' down from the snow surface. We experienced a wumpf while we were skinning and observed a large natural avalanche between Harp and Two Bowls that likely occurred during the loading events over the weekend.  We did feel comfortable skiing down the solstice gully with good travel practices. 

For more information, check out chugachavalanche.org.