Sawatch

Snowpack

John Mackinnon ยท Jan 7, 2013

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Weather

Broken to Overcast skies with thin high clouds. Calm winds and airtemps near freezing in early afternoon but dropping fast in PM.

Snowpack

Dug 4 profiles on NE aspects near treeline. HS varied from 70 cm to over 100 cm. 1 profile showed a consistently weak and faceted snowpack. The other 3 profile had seen significantly more wind loading earlier this season. The 2 deepest and most wind-loaded profiles had ~40 cm of 1F hard snow sitting on~30-40 cm of F hard DH (3.0-6.0 mm). Several old buried facet layers were IDed in these layers but didn't produce results in snowpack tests. Of note: CT and ECTs had inconclusive results with regards to propagation on the DH layers. DT tests produced consistent (SC) on DH and the 2 PSTs indicated propagation propensity as well on DH. Slabs are getting more and more stubborn. A buried facet layer in the top 20 cm showed repeated pops in shovel tilt tests. SNPX BTL was mostly weak, shallow and faceted.