Observation: Public

Observation Details

Signs of Unstable Snow

Observations

After gaining Maggie's ridge, I dug a quick pit on the NW aspect at 5350' at 12:45pm under sunny, clear skies and calm NW winds. On a 35 degree slope, simply isolating a 30cm column resulted in a sudden planar fracture at the persistent surface hoar layer buried at 37cm. I skinned further east along the ridge and out of curiosity dug a pit on the SE aspect directly below the Bowling Alley drop in. My initial column compression test yielded no results but I believe the column was affected by the sun and high temps because upon isolating another block of snow, another sudden planar fracture occurred at 16cm where more buried surface hoar persists. I took a low angle way down and encountered a slight sun crust already forming in the afternoon shadows. Found some soft snow and some fun turns but caution prevailed.