Grand Mesa
AvalancheColin Mitchell · Dec 5, 2016 · Grand Mesa
Weather
Breezy and cool. Lots of snow in the air. Mostly calm when I arrived, but became quite windy. The weather station is not showing the real winds today, probably due to the protection provided by nearby forested terrain.
Snowpack
HS averaged 60 cm. The snow surface was fist-hard facets to a depth of about 10 cm. This recent-snow layer slowly stiffened with depth until it was 1F-hard at the interface with the older snow. The mid and lower pack are composed of facets rounding, with one old wind-crust in the middle. The grains are starting to bond, and these layers are quite solid. There was one very thin layer of tiny facets about 30 down that would react to compression tests, but would not propagate on long column tests. These facets also showed signs of rounding, and this instability will likely be short-lived.
Avalanche
None observed or reported