Sawatch
AvalancheJason Konigsberg · May 17, 2024 · Sawatch
Weather
It was mostly sunny and windy at ridgetop. The wind made it feel cool. In sheltered basins, without wind, it felt hot and the snow surface was wet on all aspects.
Snowpack
An overnight freeze of the upper few inches of the snow surface led to a melt-freeze crust on Friday that stayed intact throughout the day. I was able to punch through this crust out of my skis, but with skis on, it was supportable through the day. The top 30 cm of the snowpack is changing to polycrystals and as it changes, meltwater is staying in the upper snowpack and slowly draining making it feel wet, especially on easterly slopes. If it were sunnier, warmer, and less windy, I think I would have seen some larger loose wet avalanches.---On northerly ATL slopes just the top 1-2” are wet. It’s slowly draining but if it were to get hotter and water moved faster, it could potentially pool at a melt-freeze crust at 30 down. It's not happening now or near future.
Avalanche
Old avalanches from the warm-up following our last storm. A couple of observed very small wet slab avalanches may have been more recent.