Northern San Juan
AvalancheSusan Hale · Mar 22, 2016 · Northern San Juan
Weather
Partly cloudy to mostly cloudy, warm and very windy. There was no over night freeze below 11,300' but today's cloud-cover kept daytime temps a bit cooler than yesterday's. SW winds have been severe at times averaging 35-45 Gust 60's - 70's. Seeing plenty of dust in the air.
Snowpack
Recent new-snow has merged with the old and old dust has re-appeared on surfaces near RMP. The volume loss over the past 3 days has been visually dramatic! - from a nice white snow cover to suddenly large brown patches. Blue Point lost 17" since a reading on the 16th. Since yesterday afternoon, two of our study plots lost 3". Most of our hwy paths have melted down to insignificant volume. Photo's say it all. The W-facing Brooklyns still have snow in the lower tracks (protected by the opposite peaks until later in spring). The start zones are less protected and have lost significant snow. But the lower tracks still have some winter-like conditions; upper half of a quick pit was a conglomerate of ice bodies and perk-tubes; but the lower half was a stout pencil-hard slab of dry winter snow, and 25-30 of un-reactive dry depth hoar - strong! No results.
Avalanche
In spite of long warm stretch, have seen no wet-loose activity.