Quick report
- Aspect
- North
- Red Flags
- Collapsing, Poor Snowpack Structure
- Elevation
- 2713 m
- Slope Angle
- 25°
- Red Flags Comment
- <p>Poor snowpack structure noted in the profile below. October facets were the main concern and were present about 55 cms down. </p> <p>We observed a couple large collapses in a few different places. The first was in a low angle area adjacent to the main part of the bowl. The second was right along the ridge. In this one we were actually standing on thin snow that was connected to a deeper, windblown area.</p>
Snowpack
- Instability Comment
- <p>October snow was very reactive in snowpit tests (fairly sudden shear) and the likely culprit in a number of large collapses. It could easily produce large avalanches. </p> <p> </p> <p>I selected "same" for the trend below because this will probably be a factor for a few weeks, depending on weather and snow.</p> <p>Prefrontal winds created wind slabs that are now buried below about 30 cms of good low density snow. These were present even in relatively protected areas. This can make wind slabs hard to spot.</p>
Along ridges snow had minor wind affect but skied well in more protected trees. There was a wind layer about 30 cms down which helped to keep the snow feeling supportable. Coverage seemed pretty decent, especially with last year as a reference.