Observation: Mirror Lake Highway

Persistent Weak Layer

Decreasing Danger

The northeast winds have been blowing in the moderate to strong range for quite a while and have run out of snow to transport. The remnants of these winds are scattered hard slabs on terrain features lee to these winds more common mid-slope than in high start zones. Cross loading of mid-slope gully features would be the most common theme. The hard slabs are very stubborn, not well connected and unlikely to be triggered but could cause a problem in unforgiving terrain.

Wet Snow

Increasing Danger

Warm temperatures yesterday (1/25) caused snow on solar aspects (that were sheltered from wind) to become damp all the way to 10,800 ft. The warming at upper elevations was limited to the first few cms from the surface and not hazardous. Below 10k ft we were able to push some small wet loose on steep rollovers on solar aspects. I think the high density of the snow due to wind compaction on southerlies will limit the extent of the wet avalanche hazard.