Sunny Skies and Soft Turns

It had been a few weeks since our last visit to the Elkford area, so our objective was to assess the amount of new snow and its effect on the snowpack. We were happy to see 30–70 cm of new snow over the past 10 days or so. We noted major differences in the snowpack between north and south aspects. Prior to this new snowfall, there was a period of warm, clear, sunny weather. The warmth created a temperature crust on the surface of all south-facing terrain. This crust does not exist on north aspects, meaning the new snow is falling on previously wind-redistributed, softer snow with pockets of buried surface hoar. The mid and lower portions of the snowpack consist primarily of facets. We had a variety of results in our snow pit tests. On a north aspect, we had no propagation result on an extended column test (ECTX) and a hard result on a compression test (CTH26 SP). However, on a south aspect at treeline, we observed an easy result on a compression test (CTE7 SP). At 1:30 p.m., the temperature was -5.3°C, the skies were clear, and the wind was light to moderate from the northeast. A small amount of snow was being moved around at treeline elevation, and we observed stronger winds at ridgetop moving significantly more snow. Although we did not observe any cornices, wind slab was actively building in the alpine. We saw no recent avalanche activity in the surrounding terrain.