Southern San Juan
SnowpackAnonymous · Nov 17, 2011 · Southern San Juan
Weather
Clear sky, light SW wind gusting to 9mph.. just enough to transport surface facets very short distances. Cold temps, very cold wind, and intense solar.. SPF 45 day.
Snowpack
Dug a pit on upper 1/3 of east facing (96°TN) 32° slope (Lobo Bowl) at 11740', just below the Divide. Location generally receives moderate wind loading. 101cm snowpack. Top 1cm was surface facets, followed by a 1cm pencil melt freeze crust that overlaid a 14cm fist layer of NSF's that transitioned to DF's. This rested on a 3cm pencil melt freeze crust, and this interface produced CT8Q1x2. The upper MF crust was only apparent directly adjacent to trees, and the lower MF crust was supportable to skis and boots, and seemed to be much more wide spread across the landscape and provided excellent low-angle skiing through 25cm NSF's. Items of note were a knife hard MF crust 4cm thick at 65cm->69cm which had a very thin layer of facets between it and the underlaying 30cm thick slab of 1F wind packed grains. The thin facet layer produced CT14Q2x2 and ECTP27Q2 on adjacent columns. Overall, I rated the stability Good, with no indications of avalanches. I would have rated Very Good except for the CT14 on the shallow 32° slope.