If I'm going to dig a pit, I'm searching for a weaker area or a place that represents where a person could possibly trigger a slide. One way to search for that is by snow depth - I get out my probe, and traverse the slope getting a feel for the average depth of the snow pack. I'm not looking for the deepest snow pack or even an area of average depth, but more often a shallower snow pack area. Probing also has the added benefit of getting a feel for the layering in the snow pack. Of course, this year, in many of the shallower places, you can skip the probe and use a ski pole, handle or even basket down.

Digging snow pits can be a frustrating endeavor these days. this is a north facing slope at 10,400'. Total depth of 115 cm. Structure still looks bad, but no failure with ECT or CT tests in this location. Weakest snow was the lower facet layers. I like using shovel tilt test for the upper layers - here they seemed well bonded. With recent avalanches on similar slopes in the past week, I assume I just found a stronger area of snow, not representative of where a slide could be triggered.

This was just sort of cool - large surface hoar slightly melted and then refrozen on to an inch thick melt-freeze crust. I'm sure in a day or so, it will be completely melted into the crust.