Observation: Red Pine Gulch

Observation Date
2/6/2016
Observer Name
mark white
Region
Salt Lake » Little Cottonwood Canyon » Red Pine
Location Name or Route
Upper Red pine
Weather
Sky
Clear
Wind Direction
Northwest
Wind Speed
Calm
Weather Comments
Warm and windless day, with clear skies.
Snow Characteristics
Snow Surface Conditions
Powder
Wind Crust
Damp
Snow Characteristics Comments

Damp snow on the S end of the compass, powder on all other aspects except high east facing which had some wind damage and crust.

Red Flags
Red Flags Comments
No real red flags today except heating up of the new snow on south facing, didn't seem to get out of hand.
Comments

Went up to upper Red Pine today, once Alta has around 100 inches its time to venture out on the S side of LCC, takes a good amount of snow to fill the good runs in and cover the rocks in my opinion. Not much evidence of a unstable snow pack in upper Red Pine, there were a few soft slabs that pulled out during the storm in steep terrain but they were shallow and not packing much of a punch, no cracking or collapsing noted today and the area was basically deserted. Skied E, N,W aspects , most over 32 degrees, there was a little sluffing in the steeper terrain but nothing of consequence. SW facing got active later in the afternoon and there was some wet activity noted. Looked like quite allot of wet activity on the steeper S facing chutes across the road, noted new wet slides in Little Pine, White Pine, Tanners and Lisa Falls all probably happened later in the day because they weren't apparent in the morning. Pretty stoked on the coverage in upper Red Pine been awhile since it looked filled in.

Photos: Surface hoar forming by the lake, small soft slabs from the last storm, recent wet slide on SW facing that occurred this afternoon, South facing chutes in LCC that went through a active wet cycle today.

Today's Observed Danger Rating
Moderate
Tomorrows Estimated Danger Rating
Moderate