Gunnison

Snowpack

Zach Guy · Dec 10, 2012 · Gunnison

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Weather

3" of new snow as of 2:30 p.m.

Snowpack

On west aspects near and below treeline, snow depths average 20”, with the top 8-10” being new unconsolidated snow. Several facet layers, mostly fist hardness, make up the remainder of the snowpack. We observed numerous cracks and small, slow moving pockets less than 30 feet wide, but the new snow is not slabby enough to propagate long distances. Ski pen through most of the snowpack. On southerly aspects near treeline, we observed shallow but 1F hard windslabs developing on crossloaded terrain. Moderate collapsing on flat terrain. On east to southeast aspects above treeline, patchy faceting crusts or dirt lie below the recent snow. Some concerning facet development above the crusts, but not much of a slab above it and the layer was discontinuous on our terrain. No signs of instability.