Sawatch

Avalanche

John Mackinnon ยท Mar 30, 2014

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Weather

OVC, mild temps and mod-strong westerly winds. Observed steady moderate blowing snow above 11,500 ft.

Snowpack

Toured in Cal Gulch area: Skied WSW aspects from 11,700 ft. and N aspects from 11,400 ft. Near treeline on WSW aspects the upper snowpack is a mix of wind crusts, chalky wind pressed snow and "carveable sastrugi." Much of the week's storm snow has been transported away leaving a patchwork of dust on windward slopes near TL. The upper snowpack above 11,500 feet stayed cool on lower angled and shaded areas, but most everything below 11,500 feet on the WSW aspects we visited had a nasty melt-freeze crust on the surface. North aspects below TL held cold dry snow. We skied slopes up to 40* with no signs of instabilities. A quick test pit at 11,400 on a north aspect revealed an HS of 170 cm. The bottom 25 cm are rounding facets and DH. A deep tap test produced no results on this layer--DTN on FCxr up 25 cm. A compression test revealed a "pop" down 20 cm where the recent storm snow is resting on the upper dust layer--CTM (SP) down 20 cm on FCxr/dust layer. Recent storm snow is settling but still F-4F in hardness. The middle of the snowpack consisted of over a meter of 1F-P hard snow.

Avalanche

N.O.