Southern San Juan

Snowpack

Matt Huber · Nov 23, 2020 · Southern San Juan

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Weather

Visibility was less than 100 meters and large graupel fell for most of the trip. Winds were just strong enough to notice small drifts on leeward sides of terrain features

Snowpack

Early in the trip the 20 to 25 centimeters of new snow behaved like a reactive storm slab with cracks propagating 1-2 meters around skis and easy propagating extended column tests ECTP2. The reactivity declined as the morning progressed and the storm faded. The total snowpack depth on a northeast-facing slope near treeline was 115 cm. The surface hoar layer about 30 cm from the ground is still visible but unreactive in the standard loading steps of ECT's.