Observation Date
2/17/2020
Observer Name
Staples
Region
Salt Lake » Little Cottonwood Canyon
Location Name or Route
Upper Little Cottonwood Canyon
Comments
Over a foot of settled snow resting on a mixture of old surfaces prior to the onset of snowfall on Sunday. It appears that most avalanches were failing on the very low density snow that fell at the start of Sunday's snowfall. These fragile stellar snowflakes were on top of ice crusts or hard snow and underneath dense cohesive snow.
There may be some old and slightly faceted snow on which some avalanches happened, but from my obs and talking with a few others, the light snow layer was the main weak layer.
Photo below is a shaded aspect (one that acts like a northerly facing slope) at about 10,200 ft.
Video
The photo below is a south facing slope at 10,000 ft. Notice the fracture in the ECT occurred just above the ice crust in low density snow that fell early during Sunday's storm.
Today's Observed Danger Rating
High
Tomorrows Estimated Danger Rating
Considerable
Coordinates