Gray Butte

While snow surfaces looked appealing near and below treeline on Gray Butte, the January 6th breakable crust was inescapable. The crust was either on the snow surface in windward areas or shallowly buried by last night's new snow on leeward aspects. Either way, the setup presented a hazard for backcountry travel. Wind slab concerns were limited to small, isolated pockets on steep leeward terrain, though snowpack tests in two wind-drifted areas did not produce propagating test results. 

Last night's new snow - 3 inches at the Old Ski Bowl - and significant northwest winds left a patchwork of snow surfaces near and below treeline on Gray Butte. Windward snow surfaces (west through northwest) were the January 6th melt-freeze crust. Leeward aspects (east through south) generally held anywhere from a trace to 7 inches of new snow on the most drifted features, above the January 6th crust. The crust is fragile and varies in thickness: I measured anywhere from .1 inches to .5 inches, with softer snow (4F) underneath (see annotated photo).  Snowpack tests on two wind-drifted features (east at 7,900 feet and south at 8,100 feet) did not produce any propagating test results, only an ECTN1 down about 5 inches in the new snow. With enough of a slab above, I suspect this crust/soft snow setup could be problematic, but none of these slopes were encountered today.