Observation: Cardiac Ridge

Observation Date
3/19/2013
Observer Name
mark white
Region
Salt Lake
Location Name or Route
Cardiac Ridge
Weather
Sky
Clear
Wind Speed
Calm
Weather Comments
Nice sunny day today, and it did not get overly hot.
Snow Characteristics
New Snow Depth
4"
New Snow Density
Medium
Snow Surface Conditions
Powder
Dense Loose
Melt-Freeze Crust
Damp
Snow Characteristics Comments

The snow on N facing was scoured at the top and had a wind skin down lower, NE and E facing were the most consistent skiing, W was heinous with frozen death cookies and mostly wind scoured.

Decided to go to Cardiff today, had not been in that area since the big warm up last week. Skied N facing Key Hole to enter Cardiff, wind scoured in the top, wind skin down lower. Walked up Cardiac Ridge and did a few runs on E facing, pretty consistent skiing but definitely, bottom feeding, luckily the old bed surface was smooth. Skinning was somewhat painful without crampons but doable. I was getting some shallow wind slabs to crack out at the top of Cardiac Ridge but the were shallow and not an issue. Pics, cracking at the top of Cardiac Ridge, new wet activity on SE facing Cardiac Bowl.

Saw quite a few wet slides from last weeks warm up, took some pictures of the large ones, haven't seen any of these reported yet. Pics, wet slides on SE facing Cardiac Ridge, pretty large debris piles with chunks as big as a microwave oven.

This wet slide off Kessler E facing came out as a wet slab, you can see the flank in the first picture its about 2.5 ft deep and went to the ground.