Northern San Juan
AvalancheKrista Beyer · Apr 4, 2025 · Northern San Juan
Weather
Broken clouds, cold temperatures, and glistening surface hoar. Red Mountain Pass picked up 4 inches at .4 SWE 4/3 into 4/4. The measured storm total since 4/1 at Red Mountain Pass is 18 inches at 1.55 SWE.
Snowpack
I looked to see if facets developed at the interface of the 4/1 new/old snow. On a north-northeast slope, I found a small layer of .5 mm facets sandwiched between pencil-hard wind-packed grains and what I believe to be the old interface before the April Fool's wind event. This layer was unreactive during pit tests. The recent storm snow carried a few density change layers that had broken failures during compression tests but failed to propagate. The new storm snow has settled into 4F to 4F- density below last night's 4 inches of light snow. Surface snow varied in density across the slope, but I failed to observe cracking anywhere I traveled.
Avalanche
A couple of loose avalnches triggered by soft cornices or wind loading.