Front Range
AvalancheJason Konigsberg · Jan 19, 2023 · Front Range
Weather
Windy and cold morning. Although winds were blowing, wind loading was light as windward surfaces had hardened from previous wind. There was still decent loading at treeline near Agnes Lake but it wasn't widespread. There was about 12 inches of new snow since Sunday, Jan 15. This lines up with the .9" increase in SWE at Joe Wright SNOTEL site.
Snowpack
Below treeline the snowpack is strong and fairly deep with improving basal weak layers. Beneath the recent snow, there is a 90 cm thick slab that gets progressively harder towards the basal weak layers. It is up to pencil-hard in places. The weak layers near the ground are strengthening and are one-finger minus to four-finger hard on the hand-hardness scale. Overall the snow height below treeline averages 160 cm on northerly slopes. --- Near treeline the snow depth is 2 meters. The structure is similar to above, but the slab is thicker. ---It would be hard to trigger an avalanches that breaks near the ground but it is not out of the question. Rocky terrain with lots of shallow suspects would be terrain to avoid. There was also a lot of wind loading from Wednesday's winds in this area. Slopes like South Diamond were heavily cross loaded. If you were to trigger an large avalanche in drifted snow, there is a good chance it would step down to deeper layers.---Not surprisingly, the snow height drops off significantly while traveling north on CO-14 towards Poudre Canyon. A research group was finding snow heights of 80 to 90 cm around Barnes Meadow Reservoir. Towards the west end of Poudre Canyon, snow height around the road looked to be closer to 30 cm.
Avalanche
One small wind slab avalanche observed and some sluffing in the new snow.