Winds on Pre-Laurel Peak: SW 15-25 G 30 Temp 24° Percent of Normal: 99%

Winds from the SW were on the increase again overnight as a low pressure system tracks by to the north. Today looks like one of those days where if you don't like the weather, wait 5 minutes. We should see mostly sunny skies with some developing clouds and a very slight chance for some flurries. We'll see overall light to moderate SW winds with some higher speeds along ridge tops. High temps at 10,000' will be near 30 degrees. A low pressure system currently off the Pacific coast moves inland tonight. This system is taking a southerly track but we should pick up a few inches of snow on Thursday. High pressure and warming temperatures settle in for the weekend.

In our travels on Monday, Dave and I concluded that overall conditions are one star but that's still a huge improvement. 8" of new snow Saturday night was wildly blown and unevenly distributed and most open terrain has some degree of wind affect. Sheltered locations offer much better conditions. We continued to observe active blowing and drifting of the most recent snow, and we found wind slabs formed over the past couple of days to be widely distributed across the landscape. They varied in depth from 6"-24" with the deepest drifts found on north and easterly aspects. On southerly aspects, drifts are shallow and more isolated, often existing next to scoured surfaces. We did not observe much cracking, but we experienced several collapses indicating that slabs of wind drifted snow remained sensitive to the weight of a skier or rider. Wind slabs are gaining strength and will be much harder to trigger today, but I'd continue to remain wary of steep, wind drifted slopes.

On steep, northerly aspects, deep drifts have added stress to a persistent weak layer (PWL) of faceted snow near the base of the snowpack. This has increased the likelihood for triggering a deeper and more dangerous avalanche. We are uncertain to what degree this load has affected the PWL, and we've been wrestling with how to quantify the likelihood of triggering a deep avalanche for some time now. For more details on that see my recent blog post. The bottom line is that Dave and I are continuing to avoid big, steep, northerly facing slopes.