Vail & Summit County

Snowpack

Jason Konigsberg · Apr 12, 2022 · Vail & Summit County

Weather

There was about 12 inches of new snow at 10 AM and an additional 2 to 3 inches during the day. There wasn't much wind below treeline for most of the day, which was the only elevation band I traveled at. Winds picked up later in the day as another pulse of snow moved in. No visibility to surrounding mountains.

Snowpack

There was a foot of right-side up snow that mainly fell on a melt-freeze crust. In the non-wind-affected areas that I traveled in, there was no shooting cracks or collapsing and the new snow was not a cohesive slab. One ECT on a west-northwest facing slopes produced only non propagating results above the melt-freeze crust. Below the dusty melt-freeze crust I found weak faceted snow, but with no slab, this isn't much of an issue for now. Loose Dry avalanches was the main concern below treeline but a minor concern at that. Sluffing was most prominent on east-facing slopes. The slope would have to be near 40 degrees though to get sluffs going.