Had an afternoon opportunity to head up to Gobblers Knob to see how much wind damage there was and if it was all a big slab or if there was any soft sheltered snow. Due to Gobbie's prominent NW position it seems like it is a big wind-catcher, and sure enough over the last coupla days there had been enough wind to strip Friday's new foot of snow off the main run so that we could still see the crown from the big slide there a week ago. We didn't venture out to the main bowl to test how much of an actual windslab was there (there's a limit to providing accurate, on-the-spot observations!) and we stopped just prior to where the skin line steepens up towards the ridge and gets a bit more exposed, but we did find slabby spots even in the climb through the trees. The surface slab was about 4" thick and pulled out pretty easily, with a variety of slabs and facets below that.

As the esteemed Manti Skyline forecaster pointed out in a comment within a weekend observation, even as we move farther away from the storm, with time and with this prolonged wind "event" of the last few days the slab can/will stiffen and has the potential to be more devastating when it does fail....if it indeed it does, which it might not. And if there's a slab avalanche on top, it has the potential to step down to make a bigger avalanche below. But will 200 lbs of fast-moving skier be enough to trigger that slab? I dunno, but I won't be willing to test that theory.

Overall it's getting even more complex, and therefore scarier. And that may increase another factor later this week if much more snow comes in, which of course we need, but.....

It's a good thing that the second best thing to skiing steep untracked powder is skiing not-steep untracked powder!