Vail & Summit County

Avalanche

Drew Gibson · Apr 21, 2018 · Vail & Summit County

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Weather

Overcast, with slight periods of passing sun. Calm BTL, Light to moderate NW winds throughout the day ATL. Overall temps were warm.

Snowpack

High density, cold snow BTL, ~20-30cm new. Same accumulation NTL-ATL. Winds ATL providing wind transport, tiger stripe loading on the big, flat East ridge. Lower NE bowl had 20cm-30cm with deeper drifts, not cracking in the new load. Getting thick ATL from wind. The old snow layer is bullet proof MF crust ATL-BTL, wind buff ATL. The sun was very intermittent, but still present. Seemed to come out when the wind would die. The brief periods of sun, warm temps and ever passing clouds prevented the little amount of longwave radiation from burning off. This happened really fast despite the wind. N-NE aspects NTL-BTL were becoming gloppy. We could NOT trigger a WL on this aspect at ~36deg. Snow felt "pushy" on turns, needed more heat or steeper slope to run on the NE aspect.

Avalanche

None observed.