Vail & Summit County
AvalancheKreston Rohrig · Apr 19, 2020 · Vail & Summit County
Weather
Nice day with broken skies at the beginning, but became dark and squally around noon. Periods of gusty winds and low vis with light snow were immediately followed by short stints of blue sky.
Snowpack
2-3" of new snow helped soften crusts formed over the past two days. On solar aspects, the crust is 1-2" thick and caps softer snow below making it nice and breakable. Northerly slopes higher in the alpine were still cold and soft, but suspect in steep wind-loaded areas. We dug down and found a layer of buried near surface facets sandwiched between a rock hard old snow surface and a stiffer slab formed from last weeks storms. This layer was nonreactive in tests, but links to other recent avalanche activity around the zone.
Avalanche
We saw numerous loose snow avalanches, most on northerly-facing slopes above treeline. On the drive home more "sluffs" were observed on many aspect, all within the few inches of snow from last night.