Kobernik

Salt Lake

Rocky Point - Wolverine area

Hardesty completely blew the forecast! ;) Truth is, I would have done nothing different. Tough forecast with an overnight storm and a bunch of factors pointing to instability. I was anticipating at least some cracking and perhaps some collapsing. I thought there might have been a chance to trigger an avalanche breaking into the November faceted snow. After molesting some of the usual suspect slopes, attempting to find some cornices to kick and not getting any significant stability test results, things were pointing to pretty good stability. A number of hand pits revealed the small grained facets about 5 inches below the snow surface. Yeah, they're there but this storm wasn't enough to make them active. They are not all that advanced either in the areas I traveled. Perhaps, with the right upcoming weather, these facets will just quietly become a stable part of our snowpack without acting up. This is mostly hopeful thinking on my part. The bottom line is we need to continue to pay attention to these over the next couple of storms. I suspect that they are more advanced in other areas. They are not dismissed yet.