Northern San Juan

Avalanche

Jeff Davis · Apr 24, 2022 · Northern San Juan

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Weather

Light wind under mostly clear skies. Clouds were building to the south by early afternoon even some peaks were becoming obscured. Snow in Silverton by 5:00pm.

Snowpack

Around half an inch of SWE fell in the Red Mountain Pass area over the past 48 hours. The snow fell on a snowpack that was deep in the spring transition and has refrozen with multiple days of below freezing temperatures. The new snow came in with strong southerly winds and another layer of dust. Southerly winds were strong enough to drift snow onto leeward slopes but I did not find any slab development. Even with todays cold temperatures the new snow was warming on sunny slopes.

Avalanche

Loose Wet avalanches on steep sunny slopes easily triggered but small in size.