Toured up Mt Ellis from Bear Canyon. I was surprised at how non-wind affected the snow was after yesterday's strong winds from E-W. Cornice buildup on the ridge was minimal, soft snow was still on the surface, and the trees along the ridge to the summit still held snow. I dug a quick pit on a NE aspect at 8260', looking for buried surface hoar and/or near surface facets. Found about 8" of fresh snow on top of a right-side-up snowpack. ECTX. About 2.5' down, I found rounding facets. While I may not have found persistent weak layers in my snow pit, I suspect there are locations where SH/NSF are still preserved. Dig down and see what is going on underneath your feet, before committing to any steep slopes.
Toured into the north Gallatin today and skied on north facing terrain. Saw obvious loading in the new snow up high on the ridge lines, but no recent natural avalanches. We encountered several debris piles that were covered by new snow, probably from a few days ago and likely wind slabs based on the terrain. Skiing, we triggered 3 wind slabs (ss-d1-r1) on a north west facing slope at around 7800’, each ran the entirety of the face. Notably, one of the slabs propagated above the skier and about 20-25 ft to the right. Skiing a north east slope (slightly more sheltered), no signs of instability were observed. We didn’t observe a weak layer underneath the most recent new snow, but we did see a layer of dust and crust deeper in the pack.
Saw this small soft slab above Round Lake today. SE facing, 9500 ft. Likely skier triggered, there were lots of ski tracks on that hill. Photo: J Mundt
On the ascent, particularly above 8000 ft using quick pole insertion tests, my group noticed a first crust at about 12-15 cm, a middle soft weak layer, and then about 45-50 cm down a second crust, then weak soft snow to the ground.
On a SE slope at 8750 ft elevation, my group performed an ECT and PST test. The snow temp was -15 C and the air temp was -14 C.
Snow height was 115 CM.
Test results:
ECT X
PST 55 cm/100 on the weak layer of depth hoar from 25 cm to ground.
The first 8 cm was fresh snow--dendrite or decomposing precipitation particles (F hardness). The next four layers from 107-67 cm were various layers, including a dust layer, mostly rounds, minimal faceting, 4F hardness. From 67 CM and lower, there was an increase in faceted snow, and of course, depth hoar for the last 25 cm.
This afternoon we rode up to Henderson Bench, then up Lulu road to the Cabins below Scotch Bonnet. It was snowing lightly most of the day with light to moderate wind. Wind was steady moderate near Lulu Pass. Visibility was limited, but we got a brief look at some of Henderson Bench and Scotch Bonnet.
We saw 3 avalanche that broke 6-10" deep within the recent snow, R1-D1s, 20-40' wide.
For the next 1-2 days I expect any fresh drifts will be easy to trigger. There are some density changes within the recent snow that could cause storm slab avalanches to break easier on non-wind loaded slopes.
We dug on a northeast facing slope at 9,360' elevation. Below the dust layer that was deposited at the end of last week's storm there is a lower density layer of precipitation particles that was preserved. This produced an ECTN in our test, but seems like it could contribute to avalanches for the next few days at least. (profile attached).
Snow that fell since last weekend was settled to about 2.5-3 feet. We did find some small facets buried below the last week's snow, but they were not showing obvious signs of being a widespread problem. I am still cautious that larger, wider avalanches could break on this facet layer until the snowpack has 1-3 more days to adjust to the weight of recent snow, especially on wind-loaded slopes.
Practice cautious route finding and careful snowpack assessment as avalanches are likely within the recent snow, and possibly could break 2-4 feet deep below all the snow that fell over the last week.
