Northern San Juan

Snowpack

Matt Huber · Apr 1, 2023 · Northern San Juan

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Weather

A beautiful early April morning. Winds were light with no visible blowing snow, temperatures in the upper twenties.

Snowpack

One solid whumpf near treeline on an east-facing slope. The crack was visible about 10 meters around me in an isolated, cross-loaded terrain feature. The failure was on a crust-facet combination about 20 cm from the surface. I searched out similar terrain features for slope stability tests and was unable to produce more collapsing. The total snowpack depth is about 150 cm deep near treeline and continues to gain strength. It has become mostly supportable, only breaking through to the basal facets on skis near rock outcroppings. No evidence of water penetrating deeper than the top 10-20 cm, although expect that to change this afternoon and tomorrow.