Date of Observation: 01/16/2021
Name: Zach Guy
Zone: Southeast Mountains
Location: Various valley locations near Crested Butte
Aspect: North East
Elevation: 8900-9200′
Avalanches: None
Snowpack: We targeted a handful of obvious windloaded features from strong valley winds near town. Wind drifted slabs were 2″ to 5″ thick, pencil hard. Some would crack after undercutting and stomping on the slope, others would crack as we crossed the slope, with shooting cracks up to 10′. Slabs were all small and localized to easily identified features such as rollovers or in gullies.
The rest of the terrain that we traveled on was all bottomless facets with some wind texture on the surface.
Photos:
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- Shallow cracking in a wind drifted rollover
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- Pencil hard drift, 3″ thick
