Vail & Summit County
AvalancheDylan Craaybeek, Andrew McWilliams · Dec 7, 2022 · Vail & Summit County
Weather
Cool morning in Vail (20F at Pitkin Creek TH at 8:45). Quickly warming to above freezing temperatures below around 9000 ft. and mostly sunny with Scattered to Broken sky coverage throughout the day. Mostly Calm with a Light breeze above the treeline and little to no observable snow transport in the Gore today.
Snowpack
Below about 9500 feet the snowpack is still pretty shallow consisting mostly of the most recent storm on top of basal crusts. Southerly slopes below the treeline developed a melt-freeze crust (MFcr) throughout the day today on the current snow surface. Above about 10000ft. to the near and above treeline elevation bands widespread collapses were triggered on the majority of slopes we approached including west and southwest aspects. Wind-sheltered areas also have enough of a slab to be concerning around Outpost peak with the slab being 1F- to 4F hard on the hand hardness scale and around one foot thick on top of weak facets. A much thicker slab exists (~0.5m) on wind-loaded slopes and 1F hard on the hand hardness scale at the bottom of the slab. Snowpack tests had propagating failures on the weak facets directly below this slab (ECTPs between 10-20 taps).
Avalanche
Observed a few natural avalanches that looked like they occurred within the past 24-48 hours. Two avalanches coded separately for the Avalanche Explorer tool here: https://classic.avalanche.state.co.us/caic/obs/obs_report.php?obs_id=72653 https://classic.avalanche.state.co.us/caic/obs/obs_report.php?obs_id=72654