Northern San Juan
AvalancheSusan Hale · Apr 1, 2017 · Northern San Juan
Weather
Mild temps, mostly cloudy gave way to partly cloudy skies by noon. No wind at lower elevations.
Snowpack
Toured up WNW facing slopes of avalanche path that had deep, old debris below all the newer snow - stout, dense. West facing walls of the track were melting out to ground in a few places while the center was over 195 to 220 cm. Upper pack was already moist and consisted of 3 distinct layers from the recent series of storms - each separated by 1cm thick fragile crusts. The latest snow (approx 10cm here) was poorly bonded to the old crust below - with CT3 x 2 results above and below the crust beneath. The shear above the crust was very clean. The next layer below failed with CT13 score but had a rough interface. These instabilities will likely disappear through the next warm spell, but should be of concern in the short-term with the next round of snowy weather forecast for Monday.
Avalanche
Observed new snow sluff activity from steeper terrain in the alpine - a few D1.5. Any aspect that saw sun today.