Vail & Summit County
SnowpackAndrew McWilliams · Feb 29, 2024 · Vail & Summit County
Weather
Moderate westerly winds at ridgetop with clear skies and temperatures in the twenties.
Snowpack
On the westerly slopes I traveled right at treeline, I observed a snowpack of variable depth. In drifted areas, the height of snow was well over 150cm. These areas quickly transitioned to areas less than a meter deep with lots of patches of bare ground exposed. Once you traveled into the trees the depth was more consistent and averaged about 120-150cm. On the easterly slopes where I traveled the snowpack wasn't much deeper, but there was more consistent coverage across the terrain and I didn't find any areas with less than a meter of snow unless they were right next to an exposed bush or rock. Drifted areas were up to two meters deep. February weak layers were present in all of my snowpits, but some pits only had a single weak layer and others had two. Extended Column Test (ECT) results had non-propagating results on these layers. In both of my pits on west aspects, there was a rounding surface hoar layer about 30cm from the surface. One pit had a second layer that was 50cm from the surface. On easterly aspects where I dug, the upper February weak layer was a softer faceted layer sandwiched between dense, wind-packed slabs of snow. There were some recent Wind Slab avalanches on easterly aspects that were composed of snow transported in the past day or two and did not fail on a persistent weak layer. In my westerly pits, I got results on the basal facet interface after multiple taps from the shoulder in ECTs. The February weak layers are still my primary layers of concern, but on westerly slopes, you could still trigger a deeper avalanche if you found the right trigger point. Recent Wind Slab activity will likely be stubborn by Friday and will be a distracting concern by Saturday. I didn't see that these were failing on a persistent weak layer, so the Persistent Slab problem will still focus on layers from the first half of February.