Aspen

Snowpack

Greg Shafffran · Dec 22, 2014 · Aspen

Weather

At 7am the top of Aspen Mtn reported 1.7" new, while the midway station claimed 9.9", reaching 11.6" before being cleared at 9am. Winds were moderate-strong out of the NW. There was 48cm on a storm board at 11300, which hasn't be cleared since the snow that fell Thursday (12/28). On the east side there was 28cm new above a cat road that had been driven yesterday, and 50-60cm new on a ski traverse at ~10500'. So in short, sustained and moderate to strong west winds made the new snow depth highly variable. At 2:30 large graupel (~6cm) started falling.

Snowpack

We observed an aprox 5 cm thick band of graupel, within the recent storm snow (at aprox 10-20cm down). This layer would crack right next to the skin track, and while traversing above McFarlands on SE-NE terrain at 11,000ft we observed a couple larger shooting cracks, and medium-sized collapses in isolated areas. There was moderate-strong blowing snow, which quickly refilled our tracks, and brought visibility to very close to zero late in the day.