Quick report
- Red Flags
- Wind Loading, Cracking
- Red Flags Comment
- <p>Not many signs of unstable snow today other than the gusty southwest winds creating soft wind slabs early in the day, but by late afternoon some of these wind slabs were getting deeper and more dense on north and northeast facing slopes.</p>
The Gold Hill area looks really good with much of the terrain white and filled in. The cornices continue to grow from steady south and southwest winds.
Still able to locate some of the buried weaker layers with a quick shovel compression test. The weak layers take some moderate to strong taps from both the elbow and shoulder to get them to fail. Some heavy wet dense snow should be a good test as to how strong these layers are.
Mostly confined to the ridge lines, these soft wind slabs were manageable breaking at and just ahead of skis and sleds early in the day, but as the winds continued and got a bit stronger the slabs were breaking a bit deeper and wider.
Snowpack
- Instability Comment
- <p>I was finding mostly soft and manageable wind slabs along the Gold Hill ridge line, but by mid afternoon the southwest winds were getting stronger and the slabs more dense and deeper. The hazard was mostly confined to the higer ridge lines and felt the hazard was in the modeate category, but as the winds continued the hazard was approaching more of a considerable danger. </p> <p>A few weaker layers can still be found under the recent storm and deeper down with past snow events, but no alarming test results. With upcoming strong winds and heavy dense snow, more weight and stress might bring to life a few layers? </p>
The big storm snow seems to have mostly settled and excellent riding and turning continues on the north slope. Sheltered mid elevation has great powder and dense loose snow, while on the exposed ridge lines winds were light around mid morning, but were in the moderate category in the afternoon.