Observation: Uintas

Observation Date
2/28/2020
Observer Name
jg
Region
Uintas
Location Name or Route
Upper Weber Canyon
Weather
Sky
Clear
Wind Direction
South
Wind Speed
Light
Weather Comments
Spring-like weather today. Calm off the ridgeline, light winds from the south on the ridges with wind speeds picking up a bit toward the end of the day but not effecting snow stability. Ambient temps at 9k in the mid to upper 30's and mid to upper 20's at 10,500 ft.
Snow Characteristics
Snow Surface Conditions
Dense Loose
Faceted Loose
Wind Crust
Melt-Freeze Crust
Damp
Snow Profile
Aspect
Northwest
Elevation
10,100'
Slope Angle
34°
Comments
Beautiful day in the mountains. The sun and wind have had their way with the snow but we still found soft snow on wind sheltered terrain on the north half of the compass. Old wind slabs were unresponsive and the snowpack is unenergetic right now. I did find a couple of persistent weaknesses in the upper 40 cm's (15") that I'll be keeping my eyes on. Not prevalent everywhere I traveled, I found a rime crust 10" down with weak snow above and below it. I was also finding a weakness 15" down on large grain facets. Neither weakness propagated across an extended column but I had failure on shovel shear tests with easy to moderate effort and CT failures were with hard effort. Possible weaknesses to keep an eye on as we add more weight to the snowpack. Overall a low danger for avalanches on all aspects with a mixed bag of snow conditions.
Today's Observed Danger Rating
Low
Tomorrows Estimated Danger Rating
Low