Morning outing up LCC into Days Fork. Curious if we could find early-stages corn (answer: No) and also look at the few weak layers in the top half meter of the snowpack on northerly aspects. I was away for about 10 days in early March, and during this time a few heat crusts formed with some facets around the crusts. There is also a layer of graupel that is found down about 45 cms (18") that I believe formed on or about March 6. On Thursday I was getting moderate​ (STM) clean shears at this graupel layer in Silver Fork. Today in Days Fork, shears were still clean, but required sustained pressure (STH).

Currently there is no energy in the slab on top of the graupel layer, and I have been unable to get any ECTs to propagate. However one of these weaker layers may have been the culprit in the natural avalanche early on Wednesday morning on Cardiac Ridge.

Mark Staples put together a nice blog post - which also combines some excellent field work from Evelyn - that describes what is going on on upper elevation Northerly aspects.

The graupel layer appears to be gaining strength. And these few weak layers on upper elevation northerly aspects do have spatial variability. But it is worth watching ahead of what is hopefully a stormy week. Additionally, although it does not look like Northerly aspects will warm this week, we are at a point in the season when we can expect them to undergo warming for the first time, and it is worth keeping these layers in mind when meltwater inevitably begins to percolate down through the snowpack on north aspects.

Video discussion of the weak layers in the top half meter of snow.

Hazard was Low this morning, and likely rose to Moderate in the afternoon with warming from the sun. However I suspect that the gradual warmup has generally minimized loose, wet activity on solar aspects.