24 Hour Snow: 0" 72 Hour Snow: 0" Season Total Snow: 82" Depth at Gold Basin: 37"

Under clear skies mountain temperatures are in the mid 20's. Light southeast winds overnight will shift to the south southwest today. High temperatures will again climb up into the low 40's at 10,000'. A chance for snow develops on Sunday night into Monday as a weak storm tracks by to the south. A more active pattern looks to be picking up later next week.

It's really felt like spring in the mountains the past several days and the snow surface has felt the effects (check out my observation from Thursday). Sun exposed slopes are crusted over and many south aspects are melted out to the ground. If you get it early, south slopes that still have snow cover should have a supportable, corn like surface this morning. Northwest winds a few days back etched the snow surface in exposed locations and you'll have to seek shelter for soft snow. Underneath, the snowpack is still like early January. At 66% of average, and with long dry spells in between storms, the snowpack remains shallow, weak, and faceted. The Valentine's Day storm capped it all off with a dense slab creating a text book "strong snow over weak snow" scenario. Outward signs of instability such as collapsing and whumphing have diminished, the surface is tired and worn, and things don't appear to be all that dangerous. But the underlying structure remains very poor and I don't trust it. The only safe strategy is to keep your slope angles to less than 30 degrees which is what I plan to continue to do, possibly for the remainder of the season.

For more on this check out the UAC blog post Understanding the Risk of Persistent Weak Layer Avalanches .