Vail & Summit County

Snowpack

Snowpack is extremely variable over short distances. The upper snowpack is composed of ~30cm of soft snow from the last week, fresh wind slabs up to 60cm thick in wind-loaded areas, and crusts near the surface on sun-exposed slopes below treeline. Where the snowpack is more than about 1m thick, there is a stiff mid-pack with imbedded weak layers. A weak foundation of depth hoar in the bottom 30-60 cm can be found nearly everywhere there is snow.