The meltwater is driving deeper on northerly slopes

Date of Observation: 03/28/2022
Name: Eric Murrow

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: Washington Gulch. Obs come from the Northwest and Southeast zones.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Numerous loose avalanches from the past few days on east and west aspects. I did not observe anything new today between 11am and 430pm. I spotted a small wet slab that likely ran on Sunday 3/27 and a couple loose avalanches on NW slopes of Emmons at 12,000 feet.
Weather: Increasing cloud cover throughout the day and slight increase in winds. Warm temperatures that felt a small amount cooler than the day before.
Snowpack: I was looking to track meltwater depth on northerly slopes. On northeast and northwest slopes around 11,500 feet, I found that meltwater had formed an ice lens above the February facet layer and a small amount of water was oozing through the lens into the mostly dry facet layer. On a drifted east slope at 11,900 feet, I found that meltwater had moved through a very dense 1-meter thick slab past the February weak layer and was pooling in denser snow below Feb facets. On a due north slope at 9500 feet, the meltwater had formed an ice lense above the February facets with liquid water present along the ice lens and weak, dry facets below; on an adjacent northeast portion of this feature the Feb facet layer was wet. See profiles for more details. Low elevation sunny terrain was close to an unsupportive, mushy mess in the later afternoon. I produced a few moderately-sized rolling collapses in the valley bottom around 430.