By 10:30 AM, the snowpack was already quite soft, and a short while later, the superficial refreeze was completely gone, and the conditions were becoming unsupportable. The unsupportable surface snow makes for challenging and poor skiing. The snow surface has some dust that's making things sticky and slow. The prolonged heat wave has done a number on the snow surface, snow coverage, and backcountry enthusiasm. There have been several large wet snow avalanches over the last week or so, and the weather continued to create conditions for Wet Slab avalanches and large wet loose avalanches that gouge deep into the snowpack and entrain significant volume. As conditions begin to cool, the likelihood of triggering a wet snow avalanche will begin to decrease, but it will take a solid refreeze and a longer period of below-freezing temperatures for things to lock up.
