Avalanches: A few natural and skier triggered shallow wet loose in the afternoon on very steep, sunbaked slopes.
Weather: Calm to light winds, few clouds, warm.
Snowpack: 3-6″ of wet grains over a solid crust, or moistening dry snow on more northerly tilts.

Avalanches:
Weather: Hot baby hot. With calm winds and few clouds.
Snowpack: Not much for any signs of last weeks epic wind storm in Climax area. PS structure at ridegline on a previously wind-loaded terrain feature. CT24 SP down 45cms on old faceted snow with a decomposing slab on top, but still 1f above the week layer. We avoided this terrain feature. Below ridgeline the slab became thiner and more decomposed as the PS structure tapered away.

On a more easterly tilted, steep slope, small loose wet avalanches were easy to trigger. Observed at 9,600ft. Northeasterly facing slopes were still dry at noon.

IMG_3079

Avalanches: None.
Weather: Thin clouds increased through the day. High of 45/24. SW winds 20-25mph, gusting to 45.
Snowpack: Upper 5-10 cm became wet at lower elevations by PM. Began to refreeze around 3p.m.

Avalanches: large cornice fall NE aspect, Mid size wet/dry loose slides on southerly’s aspects all in Redwell Basin
Weather: Clear with hint of hays from the west (dust), hot in the lower to mid elevations with, increasing moderate winds with strong gusts out for the NW.
Snowpack: The wind has affected most slopes W-NW-E NTL and ATL with wind board, textured and sustrugi snow surfaces. NE facing slope at 10,500ft HS 190cm with F hardness 30-40cm down to a faceted interface 4F to 1F blow. It looked as though the weak persisting slab structure has faceted out. Strong solar on S-SE slopes had produced roller balls from hot temp the day prier. No other instabilities with observed.

Avalanches: numerous D1 wet loose on SE-S-SW facing slopes.
Weather: clear, 20mph westerly breeze at ridgetop kept ambient temp feeling cold, but strong solar and temps softened all but due north
Snowpack: Did not dig, but all but northerly snow surfaces became moist with temperatures and solar. Snow grains are transforming to granular corn where previous winds last week kept new snow from acccumulating. New snow still has a few more days of freeze/thaw before proper corn develops on e-S-W facing terrain. On shady northerly slopes, surface snow has faceted 20-40cm but underlying snow reamins slabby above facets.

Avalanches: Observed about 20 skier triggered and natural wet loose avalanches, mostly D1 to D1.5 in size, although a couple were large enough to bury someone. These were primarily on steep and windsheltered E to SE to S aspects NTL. It seems higher elevations got so blasted by winds that the surface was too dense or crusted for wet concerns under today’s weather. See photos.
Weather: Warm, few/scattered thin clouds. Light winds.
Snowpack: On SE to S aspects NTL, there was 3″ to 10″ of very wet to slushy snow over a firm frozen crust, sliding easily steep slopes.
A pit on a NE aspect NTL showed a mix of hard propagating and non-propagating results on facets below a crust about a foot deep. (ECTP22, ECTN x 3, PST 80/100 END). Above treeline, it looked like a number of suspect northeasterly slopes saw some amount of persistent slab scouring during the recent extreme wind event.

Skier triggered “slub” in action.

D1.5’s. SE aspect NTL

D2 SE aspect NTL.

S aspect NTL. Slow moving skier triggered wet loose avalanches, D1.5. Some failed with a little slab-like propagation.

NE aspect ATL. Old persistent slab crown visible in the shadows. Note the slab erosion textures across much of the face.

D1.5 SE aspect NTL

Mix of non and propagating results on buried faceted crust 30 cm deep. PST 80/100 END shown here.

D1.5, S aspect NTL.