Field observations – last four days, The Crags drainage

Quick report

Weather

warm, foggy

Ride Type

denseTrees, mellowSlopes

Stayed Away

steepSlopes, sunnySlopes, convexSlopes, alpineSlopes

Riding Quality

ok

Snow Conditions

wet, powder, heavy

Avalanche Conditions

avalancheConditionSlab, avalancheConditionSound, avalancheConditionTemp

HST 30cms~, immediate lee’s closer to ridgetop 40cms. After some fantastic skiing the last few days, the warm-up has done it. The slab has finally consolidated. Temps today ranged from 1.3c mid-morning at ridgetop to 3c at the bottom of the drainage. Shifting winds over the course of the storm seem to have reverse loaded some exposed ridgetops. Despite this being inconvenient, we did not see any avalanche activity as a result until this morning (see photo). This appears to have gone naturally last night. North side of The Crags western shoulder skied excellent at end of day yesterday. We returned first thing this morning to see the effect of the warmer overnight temps. On the uptrack, hand shears were breaking cohesively with light pressure. Whumpfing was evident as well. West aspect, 2117m. 35 degrees. CTE2 SP down 30cms on rounding SH (4-5mm) over 3cm MFcr. We descended down our uptrack. Trees were sluffing at first contact with the sun. Entrainment was significant. North facing, mellow (15 degrees~) slopes skied well until end of day where they became less resilient to the warmer temps.