Quick report
- Red Flags
- Wind Loading
Forecasting Challenges for Monday -
I would expect the new snow to come in and bond well to the pre-existing snow surfaces; however this may be all academic if we see the forecast high snowfall rates. Good structure with this storm. See weather.utah.edu NAEFS plumes for Alta tomorrow - high PI spiking at 6am Monday see below. Similarly, models suggest not much wind with the passage of the trof axis tomorrow...only to have the northwest winds ramping up again in the late afternoon. Rapidly changing conditions will be the name of the game. We'll see how things shake out.
Snowpack
- Instability Comment
- <p>Wind transport taking place even well off the ridgelines; Figure 8 Hill on the Brighton side seemed to be seeing significant wind drifted snow. Terrain channelling led to wind transport also on south and west slopes at mid-elevations.</p> <p>At the 2004 ISSW in Jackson, WY, Stevens Pass snow safety lead Patty Morrison presented a <a href="https://arc.lib.montana.edu/snow-science/item/1079">paper</a> that highlighted her research on terrain channelling at her ski area. </p> <p> Instead of dropping cornices to test the sensitivity of the wind drifted snow, I kept well away. Cornices are too large to be trifled with. </p> <p>The early week snirt layer was buried roughly 50cm down in the mid-elevations. I found no reactivity with testing at or adjacent to this layering.</p>
Maritime. Warm and dense.