Observation: Salt Lake 3/6/2010

Observer Name:

Leigh Jones

Observation Date:

03/06/2010

Region:

Salt Lake

Location or Route:

Grizzly, Figure 8 Hill, Silver, Days

Weather

Weather Comments:

Mid-high clouds, overcast midday w/ breaks late afternoon; INCESSANT wind, moderate, SE; temps 20s--chilly in the wind!

Snow Characteristics

Snow Characteristic Comments:

Patchwork consisting of soft, med density new snow on sheltered and N-facing aspects...soft but much higher density, 'throw-you-over-the-handlebars' wind lips...sastruggi and wind board along ridges...surface sun/temperature crusts at lower elevations.

Clouds and wind were double-whammy, mitigating heating on S-facing.

Fair bit of saltation and transport, both along ridges and down into drainage guts where wind was funneled. Except for the more sheltered, it seemed few places were spared the wind-blasting.

Red Flags

Recent Avalanches

Cracking

Collapsing

Red Flag Comments:

In Twin Lakes Pass/Milly back bowl area: A few wind pockets pulled out today. Plenty (ok, tons) of cracking in the various newly formed wind features, including a more substantial collapse and crack of one that we got about 100 ft down from the ridge. Also got a small pocket (~10-15 ft wide, few inches deep) to pull out on a ski cut, NE @ 10.2k' just off the ridge. Investigated another, skier-triggered pocket down the ridge, about twice as large. And also investigated a wider (~175-200 ft) skier-triggered slide off the back of Milly. These were all manageable, SS, small in size, not running far, newest, wind-loaded snow.

Couple of interfaces found in the new snow (mid-storm, pre-storm), but non-reactive. On steep N and NW aspects (Silver & Days) @ 9.5-10k', sluffing was the rule...shallow, slow-running, but sometimes entraining a bit more.

Primary Concern

Primary Concern:

Wind Slabs

Probability:

Considerable

Aspect:

North

Northeast

Northwest

Elevation:

High

Mid

Trend:

Same

Primary Concern Comments:

Pockety in nature. Don't see the winds dying down too much tomorrow...and add an extra inch or two of new snow to blow around.

Secondary Concern

Secondary Concern:

Persistent Slabs

Probability:

Moderate

Aspect:

North

Northeast

Northwest

Elevation:

Mid

Trend:

Same

Secondary Concern Comments:

It is persistent...

snow_profile_location:

Observed Danger Rating:

Considerable

Forecast Danger Rating:

Considerable