Steamboat & Flat Tops
Avalanchejohn morrone ยท Dec 17, 2014
Weather
broken clouds and sun in AM, becomming cloudy, with light snow and celing about 10,500' in PM. dang nice turns, a bit of edge scraping on the buried ice layerin driven turns on steeper terrain.
Snowpack
skiied about 12-18" soft pow on east (lee) exposure, skin track partly windward, maybe 4" storm snow over ice crust. ice crust from steamboat opening day (tue PM/wed. before thanksgiving). notable storm totals of 2-4" at thanksgiving, 15-18" on 12/13-15. another couple of inches in last several days. gentle w breeeze- 5 mph?, no blo snow. ski pen = ankle, boot pen = shin to knee. snowpit on 27 degree E slope at 10,100', HS=105cm, soft storm snow not yet cohesive enough to be a soft slab = 30 cm hs=105 Fist strm snow to 75, 4 finger soft slab to 65 facets over ice at 63 1 cm ice 4 finger facets under ice to 57 1 finger snow to 12 (with v. thin seam of buried surf facets midlayer (not reactive)) 1F-4F small facets at base temps: air- -6c t20=-4 t50=-5 base=0 t in facets over ice= -3 (63 cm) t in facets under ice = -5 (56cm) CT =0, SP and SC at ice. ice difficult to saw through, final sawing results in ice plate cracking free, immediately settling into underlying facets (SC), AND slab above ice popping off (SP) on the overlying facets immediately. repeated in 3 columns in this pit, all same result.
Avalanche
none seen