Quick report
- Red Flags
- Poor Snowpack Structure
Quick scan of an older avalanche on an easterly aspect and a view of the variable snowpack around North Creek Pass.
Snowpack
- Instability Comment
- <p> </p> <p>These distinct layers were on a NNW aspect near Abajo Peak. I got two, CTH results with sudden planar fracture character. This layer is about 50 cm down and could be some buried surface hoar. In any event, there are several persistant weak layers that could produce slab avalanches as there are 1F-4F slabs resting above them. </p> <p> </p>
Snow was quite variable. Many south and westerly aspects are completely snow-free, or have very shallow snow depths. On north and east aspects, snow depth increases quickly. I did not observe any collapsing or cracking today while breaking trail. I dug a pit on an east aspect next to an older slide from Jan. 26th near North Creek Pass to better understand what layer this avalanche occurred on. It appears that it probably failed on the Jan. 22 interface (the new/old snow interface).
North and east aspects continue to have poor snowpack structure with a host of weak layers and a slab resting on top.