Front Range
AvalancheAustin DiVesta · Jan 11, 2022 · Front Range
Weather
High elevation clouds started out the day, but quickly moved out of the are becoming a warm and clear day.
Snowpack
I mainly traveled on easterly-facing slopes today with the expectation of the skin track, which was primarily due south. Warm and sunny days created a sun crust that became slightly moist by the end of the day. As soon as you move towards most east-facing slopes, the snow softens to cold, dry snow with no crust but still supportable. I dug a snowpit near treeline on an east aspect. I found a snow height of 1 meter with a reasonably strong mid-pack with the ever-present old, weak snow from late November/early December snow. The bottom of the snowpack was a mix of melt-freeze crusts and depth hoar. An extended column test revealed hard results that propagated through the column. I performed a propagation saw test, which produced weak results at 38/100 END. The only other instabilities that I found were old avalanches that most likely ran around 1/7 or so.
Avalanche
I saw several avalanches that wrapped mulitpe terrain featuers and slopes. Two avalanches were previously reported on 1/7/22