Vail & Summit County
AvalancheScott Toepfer · Jan 20, 2022 · Vail & Summit County
Weather
Lingering Diamond dust till mid morning added another trace to the 2” new on the deck this morning. 2.5% water-97.5% air. That is da kine stuff. Friend at the valley floor a mile from the haus had 4” new. Interesting, more snow at the valley floor then 500’ higher. Low was 4* and todays high made 30*. Negligible winds below treeline but 5-15 north winds above treeline added a noticeable chill to exposed skin. Some blowing snow off select high peaks but not off neighboring peaks. Quite selective. Otherwise a perfect bluebird day
Snowpack
Dug a quick cat hole at around 11,500’ on a north aspect in a 30* open park. CT15 Very smooth/clean shear popped off between the holiday snow/slab (12-18” thick) and the underlying depth hoar, which was an additional 12-18”. During transitions would step off ski and go right to ground. Ski einsink went right to ground too. Holiday slab is loosing some structure with the recent cold clear nights, but no trap doors found, yet. This structure could result in some large activity running to ground if we went into an extended storm cycle.
Avalanche
Only some older previously reported activity above treeline on east aspects