Grand Mesa

Avalanche

Anonymous · Jan 5, 2017 · Grand Mesa

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Weather

S2 in am to S-1 later in the afternoon/eve. Light winds, but they sure were howling on the drive on 70.

Snowpack

Avg HS 100cm @ 8500ft, 150cm @ 9500ft.. HN24 20cm @ 9000ft Snowpack at 9600ft, 32* slope, W facing: HS 150cm, CT 18 and CT 13, SP, down 50cm on SH. "Nonstandard force" yielded some pretty clean shears down 90cm on what looked to be rounding, buried NSF. Finely tuned pole jamming revealed no basal facets/DH all day. New snow was very low density. No cracking, but minor collapsing noted in one meadow, WNW facing. This meadow tends to get a bit more wind/slab formation than the rest of this tour.

Avalanche

None, but sky was obscured all day.