South Side: Timberline

I found improved travel conditions with 8-10 inches of soft snow over the Early February Crust (EFC). There's plenty of evidence of wind-affected snow once you crest above treeline, with deeper drifts (1-2 ft deep) existing on NE-E- SE aspects.  While I found drifted snow to be stubborn, a recent widely propagating avalanche caught my eye.  Due to the warm temps and strong sun, most steep solar aspects will have a new sun crust moving forward. 

From the parking lot elevation @ 5800 ft, I was greeted with 3-4 inches of lightly wind-affected new snow from February 9th.  As I crested above the Salmon lot, a widely propagating slab avalanche caught my eye in the Salmon River Canyon. Under further investigation, I found this avalanche failed on a layer of buried surface hoar. It was fairly shallow, but propagated widely 9 (roughly 500 ft). I characterized it as a HS-U-R2-D1.5-O. Check out my attatch avalanche observation for more details.

Climbing higher, wind-affected snow became more prominent but ski quality remained surprisingly good. Above 7000 ft, I was finding about 8-10 inches of recent snow over the stout Early February crust (EFC). 

The late morning really warmed up with nearby weather stations recording temperatures in the mid/high 30's.  The sun felt intense and it didn't take much time for the dry snow to react. I was seeing rollerballs on pretty much every steep slope pointing south extending up to 10,000 ft. These steep solar slopes will have a new surface crust come Sunday. Beyond rollerballs, I didn't observe any wet loose avalanches.

While the soft snow improved ski quality, you could still feel the rock-hard EFC underfoot and ski on steeper slope angles. I would still advise packing the crampons and a self-arrest tool for upper mountain tours.