Gunnison
SnowpackCrested Butte Avalanche Center · Jan 6, 2015 · Gunnison
Weather
Weather Warm (30 degrees), low cloud layer in the Slate River valley, clear blue skies above. Calm winds.
Snowpack
Snowpack Test pit on a 38 degree rocky rollover. 110 cm total snow depth. 52 cm of fist to four finger soft snow on top of "December 13th interface" of 1-2 mm facets. 20-30 cm of two and three finger hardness below December 13th interface sitting on 10 cm of 2-3 mm facets at the ground. Conducted several shovel compression test with widely mixed results from CT7 with a sudden collapse on the December 13th interface to CT30 that shovel sheared at the ground. One of the columns failed when cutting on the December 13th interface. Rock outcroppings in the vicinity of the test pit seemed to be contributing to the widely varied results. Bottom line, while much of the snowpack might be "MODERATE", there seems to be plenty of sensitive pockets that can be easily triggered by the weight of a skier.