Northern San Juan
SnowpackAmy Pertuz · Dec 31, 2022 · Northern San Juan
Weather
Warm with low clouds.
Snowpack
The 60cm of storm snow from 11/28 has settled into a cohesive slab 43cm thick. Dense, moist snow at the surface and at the 12/27 interface sandwich a less-dense layer of storm snow, and the recent storm snow is "upside down". There was no melt-freeze crust observed in Ophir as was reported nearby in Telluride, and no evidence of rain-on-snow. The snow surface was noticeably cohesive. On east aspects BTL, the HS ranged from 70-100cm, and 2/3rd of this snowpack height is since 1ast Wednesday. Localized collapsing around my skis would be followed by large, rumbling collapses on uncompacted terrain. A pit on an east aspect below treeline showed easy propagating failures in ECT (ECTP8) on a prominent facet interface 45cm below the surface.