Observation: NWAC Forecaster

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Weather Summary

Obscured skies persisted for the time I was out, with moderate winds above 4500ft. Temperatures where I started from at 1600ft shifted from 32F at 7am to 39F at 1pm. It was drizzling/lightly raining below 4500ft all day, and light snow was falling above that elevation.

Snowpack Observations

The snowpack was moist and very bumpy below 4500ft, and slightly refroze overnight, at least so that during the ascent I had good edging but sunk minimally. Upon return it softened so that it was a little sticky and I was sinking in around 4 inches. At about 4500ft I reached south-facing meadows where there was a solid 3cm crust at the surface, still edgeable. Snow was just beginning to accumulate on top, 1-2cm by the time I headed down at 1pm. In the meadows 4500-4800ft I found around a foot of moist snow overlying the late January crust, well bonded to the crust layer.

At 5000ft I dug a N pit where I found 50cm of snow over the Late January Crust, and I got resistant planar compression test results on shallow layer changes, and ECTN's as well. The snow was well bonded to the Late January Crust, with no layers of concern at the interface like I found in a nearby pit: on a west-facing pit at 5000ft I found a thin facet-crust sandwich at the top of the Late January Crust, which produced propagating results (ECTP14, PST 40/100 end).

Avalanche Problems

Visibility was terrible, so I only saw small nearby rollerballs which happened either today or yesterday. If I traveled in a steeper area I suspect many rollerballs or wet loose avalanches would have been triggered by me on slopes below 4500ft.