Vail & Summit County

Snowpack

Snow surfaces on southwest, below-treeline slopes were supportable at 1 PM with ski penetration of less than 1 inch and boot penetration of about 6 to 8 inches. At about 3 PM conditions were still supportable to skis but the boot penetration was drastically different and was to my waist in some areas. The places where I was punching through to the ground were mostly small open areas near trees. The one-finger re-frozen slab was collapsing on wet facets that are buried about 60 cms deep. The snowpack in this areas is very shallow at 70 cms and is probably not indicative of areas with a snowpack of over 1 meter. Near treeline slopes stayed mostly frozen during the time I was out as did any shady areas.---A snowpit on a northeast, near-treeline slope showed the same faceted layer buried 40 cms deep that is found across much of the zone. This pit produced test results of ECTP16 and PST END 20/100. No wet or moist snow in the snowpit.