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Observation: Cardiff Fork

Observation Date
4/2/2014
Observer Name
Kobernik
Region
Salt Lake » Big Cottonwood Canyon » Cardiff Fork
Location Name or Route
Alta-Holy Toled-East Mineral-Santiago
Weather
Sky
Broken
Precipitation
Moderate Snowfall
Wind Direction
Northwest
Wind Speed
Light
Weather Comments
Lots of blue sky til around 10am. Clouds and periods of snow into the afternoon. Accumulations not a whole lot.
Snow Characteristics
New Snow Depth
12"
New Snow Density
Medium
Snow Surface Conditions
Powder
Snow Characteristics Comments

The new snow settled into what felt like 12". Very nice turning with bottomless conditions on most aspects. Cloud cover mid morning and into the afternoon helped a lot to keep riding conditions good. Despite the cloud cover and snowfall, there will be heat crusts around on Thursday morning aside from the higher northerly aspects.

Red Flags
Red Flags
Cracking
Red Flags Comments
Typical spring storm scenario, less sensitive today than yesterday. Still some instability noted on the steeper slopes.
Avalanche Problem #1
Problem
Persistent Weak Layer
Trend
Decreasing Danger
Problem #1 Comments

The little bit of evidence of instability of the new snow was enough to keep us from messing around with steep slopes that had recent drifts.

Comments

It was very easy to stay out of trouble today and get a bunch of good skiing. We just avoided slopes approaching 40 degrees that were in areas with wind effect. A good example was that we avoided the main line in the top of East Mineral. This is north facing, 40+ degrees with a nice wind slab on it. I have a good feeling it would have released if provoked. Short and steep roll-overs were still cracking and we were able to get a couple of non-consequential 10' wide slabs to open up. Nothing going on in the 35 degree range that I noticed, you really needed a slope of about 40 degrees to find trouble.

Heating will most likely be the main concern on Thursday.

Today's Observed Danger Rating
Moderate
Tomorrows Estimated Danger Rating
Moderate