Grand Mesa
SnowpackDylan Craaybeek · Dec 8, 2023 · Grand Mesa
Weather
On and off light to moderate snowfall with steady moderate westerly winds occasionally gusting strong. A short period of sunshine broke through the storm around noon for about an hour.
Snowpack
There are multiple layers (one to three) of fully intact surface hoar between the snow surface and the basal facet layer. The basal facet layer is not nearly as well-developed around here as the rest of the Central Mountains and much less reactive. All snowpack tests failed on the layers of buried surface hoar and even targeted shovel shear tests did have planar breaks on the interface between the November snow and the October facet layer. The uppermost layer of buried SH is the largest and the most worrisome moving forward. As the storm continues overnight and the storm snow settles in the coming days I expect shooting cracks and collapses on nearly every meadow and open slope where this surface hoar exists. Shooting cracks and collapses will likely be observed starting tomorrow and grow larger with cracks propagating further across the terrain as the snow continues to settle. The few southerly-facing slopes I looked at had a similar layer of buried surface hoar but it appeared to be mostly melted and refrozen with no results in snowpack tests.