Vail & Summit County
SnowpackAustin DiVesta · Feb 12, 2025 · Vail & Summit County
Weather
It was a breezy, cold day around Breckenridge. There were broken clouds throughout the day, and there was plenty of blowing snow.
Snowpack
Snowpack I dug several snowpits throughout the day, and all pits propagated in all long column tests (Extended Column and Propagation Saw Tests). The ECTs took a hits from the shoulders for failure. The weak layer of concern was the December Drought Layer; while there is an upper weak layer, it is hard to believe that an avalanche that fails in this upper weak layer would not step down into the basal weak layer. The only pit that I dug today that did not have a melt-freeze crust from the January warm-up was the northeast-facing slope below treeline, but the near-surface facets fell out of the pit as I dug (these were Fist-Minus on the Hand Hardness scale). Near treeline, I did a PST on a southeast-facing slope targeting this basal layer and got a PST 30/100 END. This suggests that even a small load could be enough to start to see natural avalanches again in this zone.