Front Range
AvalancheHogan Warlock · Apr 27, 2020 · Front Range
Weather
Varied, going from snowing and cloudy in the morning to sunny and warm later in the day. Below treeline on the North to West aspects it was pretty wet and warm later in the day. At and above treeline, there was a lot of melting happening, and quite a few large patches of bare ground were becoming exposed that were covered in about 5 inches of snow that morning. For the most part, there was almost no wind the entire day, though around 1:30, some strong westerly/southwesterly winds picked up at the upper elevations for a good 10-15 minutes then died off.
Snowpack
After the fresh snowfall the night before, the west slopes were held together lightly, though they aren't really steep enough for any high-risk rockfall anyways. Throughout the day as the temperature steadily rose, the fresh snow melted quickly, leaving water seeping through the longer-lasting snowpack. Plenty of places in the afternoon where there simply was no snow at all (above treeline). Below treeline, snow was melting and becoming more wet, though not really melting down to the ground level. This will probably result in yet more melt-freeze crusts above treeline and a denser upper-level snowpack below treeline. Above treeline on a Northwest face, I dug a few quick pits with my hand (around 9 am) and discovered that the snowpack was only around 2 feet deep at the deepest point I could find, with the bottom foot or so being weak sugar snow, a thin ice crust on top of this, and then a medium-density wind slab on top of this (not to mention between 2-5 inches of fresh snowfall on the very top.) This snowpack is probably not going to last the week with the high temperatures that are predicted, but it is still dangerous on steeper slopes.
Avalanche
No avalanches were observed.