Vail & Summit County
SnowpackJason Konigsberg, Ryan Zarter · Dec 7, 2017 · Vail & Summit County
Weather
Bitterly cold at ridgetop but luckily winds were light making above treeline travel bearable. We did not observe any wind loading and cornices are very small to non-existent. Light snow fell for most of the day. Accumulations were light with a half inch on the truck from 9 AM till about 2 PM.
Snowpack
We looked at a west-southwest slope and found a snow depth of 35 cms. Most sunny aspects are around this depth with larger rocks lurking just below the surface. The 2 inch melt-freeze crust, that is about 10 cms down from the surface, is thinning as it facets. There is a prominent layer of faceted snow below the crust. This will be something to watch in the long term. Short term it is not an issue.---On northeast-facing slopes we continue to find a slab over a poor snowpack structure in isolated areas. The slab directly below the ridge was 18 inches thick. The slab still varies considerably across a slope, although it appeared to be more continuous down slope than expected.The snowpack structure under the slab really could not be worse as a thin ice formation caps depth hoar near the ground. There are chains of depth hoar beginning to grow underneath of the crust. Terrain features on northeast-facing slopes that were previously wind loaded continue to be the bullseye for our isolated problem. When we get a decent load the problem will no longer be isolated and avalanche conditions will quickly become dangerous.