Aspen
SnowpackDylan Craaybeek · Mar 7, 2022 · Aspen
Weather
Light to Moderate snowfall throughout the day with temperatures 10 to 20F. A few short periods of Broken sky and sunshine throughout the day. Light winds with some light snow transport along the ridgeline.
Snowpack
Northerly slopes showed numerous signs of instability with widespread collapses and several shooting cracks, one where the slab slid several inches downslope on a 32 degree slope. All of the failures occurred on the buried facet layer from the Jan.-Feb. dry spell and the slab varied from 50-80cm thick. East aspects still have the persistent weak layer insulated underneath a thin (1-3cm) melt-freeze crust (MFcr) but localized collapses could still be observed traveling on east-facing slopes. West-facing slopes show a combination of MFcr's buried under a non-cohesive slab with no signs of instability and mostly stable snowpack test results. The new snow seems to be bonding well with the MFcr's on southerly slopes as the storm came in warm and wet and has drastically decreased in density as the cold front came in and air temperatures decreased "right-side-up storm". New snow density from today was around 50-70 kg/m^3.