Observation: Public

Observation Details

Observed Avalanches

Signs of Unstable Snow

Observations

We saw no overt signs of wet loose debris throughout 2/5, but did see significant amounts of rollerballing on steep south facing slopes at approximately 6,500-7,000 ft beginning today at 1130am.

Today began with mostly rough and wind scoured surfaces on all aspects. We did do one test profile on an East facing slope just below a ridgeline at 6,745ft. This test slope was protected but provided representative sample of what we expected to find in other areas. Here, we found a hardened surface and the top 12 cm of snow seemed to be some mix of windslab with a sun and/or windscoured crust on top.

We did two CT tests here which yielded similar results, as well as an ECT:
CT2 @12cm down RP
CT18 @27cm down RP to BRK (This was difficult to discern as it was close to, but not completely planar)
CT28@68cm down BRK (Note: This layer fractured across the column on both compression tests, but was not identified as a separate layer while identifying our hand-hardness tests.
ECTN11 @ 12cm down.
The grains at these interfaces appeared to be most defragmented particles and no grossly angulated weak layers/facets were identified.

Overall we did not see any wet loose slides that stepped down to deeper layers, however, we skied what we wanted to ski, and were out of any terrain of consequence by noon.