Steamboat & Flat Tops
SnowpackMax Strotbeck · Mar 14, 2024 · Steamboat & Flat Tops
Weather
Skies were broken and temperatures near-freezing. Winds were strong from the northeast in open below treeline terrain and light to moderate where more sheltered. There was no new snow, but blowing snow was moderate to intense.
Snowpack
I spent the day touring at low elevations (<8,600ft) on Buffalo Pass on southwest through north through east aspects. I found the height of snow to average about 2 meters deep. I measured about 16cm of new snow since March 12th. However, on open east aspects I found myself walking across a 3cm crust (which developed over the few day dry-spell prior to March 12th) as the new snow had been stripped and transported to westerly aspects. Beneath the surface on an east aspect I found a mix of crusts and firmer snow, which at these lower elevations has been getting moist and healing. On open westerly aspects, new snow and wind transported snow led to areas where upwards of 45cm on snow lied above the previous surface crust. Walking on westerly aspects I experienced some localized cracking around my skis, but no shooting cracks or audible collapses. In a snowpit dug on a west-facing slope, I found 1-finger hard wind-transported snow on and beneath the surface sitting above fist hard snow, which all sat atop a thick crust that developed prior to March 12th. In an extended column test, propagation occurred with easy taps within the soft snow 15cm below the surface (ECTP5). At higher elevations where this storm deposited more snow and there was perhaps more wind, deeper propagating failures could occur and result in a more consequential wind slab avalanche. I also observed moist snow below this most recent storm snow on these low-elevation west and southwest aspects and some larger rounded grains, leading me to suspect an avalanche breaking deeper than the March 12th crust would be unlikely.