Vail & Summit County
AvalancheJason Konigsberg · Apr 1, 2017 · Vail & Summit County
Weather
Some light downslope winds in the west-facing drainage with calm winds at ridgetop.
Snowpack
Obs from a recreational trip---Friday evenings winds deposited a thin 1-finger-hard slab on top of fist-hard snow. The slab was generally 4 to 6 inches thick but there were small areas that had a 1 foot thick slab. Localized shooting cracks in the wind-drifted snow but no signs of a significant instability. Even though the slab was widespread on northerly and westerly slopes, it did not seem to want to break as a cohesive slab. Ski cuts on steep convexities produced no results. I did not travel on any east or southeast slopes but they looked to be scoured from the recent wind. The snow from the previous storm (3/29) is bonded well to a variety of underlying crusts. I was able to trigger Loose Dry avalanches at the interface between last night's storm (3/31) and the previous one (3/29). Loose Dry avalanches entrained all of the recent storm snow but were easily avoidable.
Avalanche
I triggered a few small Loose Dry avalanches in steep terrain. I also observed two larger slab avalanches that broke in steep aprons. These larger avalanches likely occurred during Friday night's strong winds and high precip rates. I didn't get a close look but they may have failed on the graupel layer that fell at the beginning of the storm.