Went to the Monitors to see what kind of damage 3 days of east wind could do in the exposed NE facing bowls, I was not too surprised to find major damage in both bowls. The top half of South Monitor Bowl was completely stripped of this years meager snowpack and West Monitor had not faired much better. West Monitor was holding wind drifted snow on the skiers right, where I was finding the weakest snow last week, looked skiable but knowing there was a foot of fully faceted snow connected all the way to the flats sitting under the wind slab seemed like a bad idea at this point in time. Photos, wind hammered South Monitor, Scotts Bowl, somewhat suspect skiers right side of West Monitor, and wind drifts on the ridge.

Decided to take a look at west facing Wills Hill, dug a quick pit at about 9800ft. Wills was not wind affected and was holding about 15 inches of snow with the bottom five inches being loose faceted sugar, I was somewhat surprised at how advanced the faceting was on this west facing slope, but in turn the shallower the snow pack the faster it facets. Clean sheer on the facets 10 inches down. Pretty punchy on the west facing, would sink through the medium density 10 inches and drop through the facets to the dirt. Tried to get a good look around for future reference, what slopes were holding snow that will probably only weaken with the high pressure, what slopes got stripped of snow, might be a good place to go when it does snow again. Photos, quick snow pit, and a recon shot of Reynolds NE face and the Wilson chutes.

I would think the hazard would be on the decline as the wind slabs rot out with the high pressure this week.