Sawatch

Snowpack

Jeremiah Primmer · Mar 10, 2022 · Sawatch

Weather

Overcast for the whole day. A squall moved in around 2 and lasted about an hour snowing S2. Only 3" at the trail head but around 12" near treeline for the storm total.

Snowpack

We headed up Denny Creek and on to some northeast-facing slopes near treeline and traveled on north-east to east through south-facing slopes. The warm spell last week has depleted the snowpack at lower elevations, and the small amount of new snow is sitting on a very robust crust. At the upper end of the treeline, we started feeling some collapses. In places where the melt-freeze cycle had been the most aggressive last week, we found a buried supportable crust sitting on 2mm facets. Moving towards northerly aspects or on more protected slopes, the collapsing stopped where the melt-freeze crust was not as thick, but the facets were still present. The snow depth on these slopes was 100-150cm. Digging a pit on a northeast-facing slope near treeline, we did not get any propagating results in either the new storm snow from the past week or on the buried near-surface facets that at this location had started to round. We noted two small fresh wind slabs that had released below a ridgeline and a rock outcrop on northeast and east-facing slopes near the treeline.