Mild temps in the last 24hrs are a good stabilizing force for the NFL (November Facet Layer), especially below 9000', but the snowpack continues to groan and grumble many days after the last load. Collapsing and whoomphing occurred on all aspects in the zone traveled. Rime crust exists buried 2-4cm below the surface from about 9000' to at least 10,200'. Two pics attempt to document it.

I got a good look at the slide(s) that were triggered by B on 12/17 in the Dog Lake Chutes. These were the real deal with the one in the Main Dog Lake Chute massing up sizable debris (pic 1). An overview photo gives a good look at how slopes around 38 deg. and steeper released and slightly lower angles in the hangfire around 35-30 degrees did not. Pay attention to these lower slope angles whenever we get another big load.

A pit dug on an adjacent 28 deg slope revealed a slightly stabilizing snowpack that is still far from being trusted. No longer failing remotely from a distance, propagation happened after 14 taps. Time to ski it up?, not quite. After spending 15-20 minutes on the slope in the pit, while putting my skis back on to fill in the hole, the entire slope collapsed up to 30' around where I was standing. I did see one glimmer of hope throughout the day in areas with HS over 120cm. Areas with a little deeper coverage have less of this troubling structure. There the facet layer is thinner with smaller grains and shows the first signs I've seen of strengthening. There's just not that many areas with over a meter in depth however.