Front Range
AvalancheJackson Emry · Jan 20, 2024 · Front Range
Weather
We observed light wind, with no precipitation. Partly sunny with cloud cover changing from Few to Broken throughout the day. We recorded a high of 37F.
Snowpack
Overall we found a very weak snowpack structure, with a buried pencil hard slab sitting on a few layers of weak facets and depth hoar. The new snow that has drifted on top of the slab produced a CTM result on the new/old snow interface, but did not have much energy. We got a CTH and ECTP 29 on the interface of the slab and the facets below. I also decided to take temps today, which yielded some interesting results. The higher daily temperatures are definitely penetrating the top of the snowpack, creating some large temperature swings throughout the pack. There was nearly a 9 degree difference in the top 50cm.
Avalanche
We observed a couple old avalanches today. The first was one that appeared to have occurred recently on a small north facing test slope on an interface between wind drifted snow and near surface facets. The second was on a south slope beneath CO-14, which was a wet slide due to warming. The group also observed what looked like a glide crack on the same slope. Estimated snow depth for this S slope was only a couple inches.