Front Range
SnowpackEli Helmuth · Dec 18, 2012 · Front Range
Weather
Very calm, thick clouds, and light intermittent snow.
Snowpack
Ranged in height from 50-100cm due to prior wind transport. Mostly new storm snow sitting on thin 10-20cm, old base with 2-4cm of depth hoar on the bottom. Snowpack was extremely reactive with widespread collapsing and cracks propagating up to 60m length in small 30-40 degree terrain, trees shaking, slabs popping from long distances on unsupported terrain. All failures observed were at the depth hoar interface so 50-100cm depths. Bonding between new and old snow was good due to warm storm conditions. Snowpack observed was primarily below treeline and treeline terrain. Above treeline the snowpack was thinner due to earlier wind transport.