Vail & Summit County

Snowpack

Jason Konigsberg, Sam Harrison · Feb 22, 2018 · Vail & Summit County

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Weather

Skies went from obscured to broken throughout most of the day. Intermittent squalls of snow did not amount to any accumulation.

Snowpack

Northerly below-treeline slopes have an HS of 130cms with a significant slab over basal weak layers. Tests show that the weak snow near the ground is hard to affect beneath the one-finger to pencil-hard slab.---On south-facing slopes, well-developed depth hoar sits at the ground. In many areas there is not a significant slab and a mix of thin, faceting crusts and faceted layers. The top most near-surface crust is thin and would not hold much of a load. We only dug on slopes less than 30 degrees and I assume the southerly crusts would thicker and stronger on steeper slopes.