Vail & Summit County
AvalancheJason Konigsberg, Ryan Zarter · Feb 2, 2018 · Vail & Summit County
Weather
Strong winds were felt just at ridgetop with calm conditions in basins. There was no snow transport that we observed in our travels. Skies were anywhere from overcast to scattered with short periods of sun and no precipitation.
Snowpack
In above treeline areas that we traveled we found a snowpack with a variable depth and the variation in depth corresponded to different layering. Thin areas were mostly faceted with about 10 cms of new snow at the top. Deeper areas were from 1 meter to 1.5 meters deep and consisted of very hard slabs of snow with small facets at interfaces and depth hoar near the ground. The overall structure and strength of the slab in deeper areas would make it difficult to trigger an avalanche that breaks near the ground.---We went searching for a Wind Slab avalanche problem but found no evidence this issue exists. Although there were areas of wind-drifted snow up to a foot deep, we did not observe and cracking and the new slab is bonded well to underlying crusts and harder snow. The main future near-surface concern would be a faceted layer that exists beneath crusts about 20 cms from the surface. If we were to get a large load in the upcoming week or so, this faceted layer would be a potential failure plane. Bottom line is hard wind-drifted slabs exist in isolated areas but they also would be hard to trigger.---Small rollerballing was observed on steep southerly road cuts.
Avalanche
No cracking, collapsing or recent avalanches observed.