Overall danger is low. We might get some snow this week, so I wanted to check on overall surface conditions. BTL is exactly what you would expect, mostly faceted to the ground, and the surface snow is also weakening.
I found interesting conditions on southerly aspects up in the wind zone. Recent shallow wind slabs (up to 5 inches) are still sensitive. In my travels with Chris and Travis on Saturday we encountered reactive shallow drifts in steep terrain on W, and SW aspects in upper Talking Mountain Cirque. They are still sensitive today, because the drifted snow was deposited onto a thin layer of facets about 1mm in size. This weak layer most likely formed by the process of radiation recrystallization. Very cold temperatures and clear skies around 1-19 to 1-21 would have been the perfect weather conditions to form this layer. A strong NW wind event occurred on 1/21 and 1/22 and drifted shallow wind slabs onto southerly aspects, preserving the newly formed layer of facets. Typically our prevailing winds are out of the SW, which would have potentially destroyed this weak layer.
The photo below is where we first spotted this layer in upper Talking Mountain Cirque on a SW aspect.
Shallow winds slabs were cracking out today on this layer in the Upper Funnel and Showoff.
I found them to quite sensitive because they were failing on facets.
I went over to Showoff and found the layer to be preserved there as well. It is very sensitive and resulted in CTV and ECTPV. (The thin wind slab failed on isolation in both tests). Below, you can see the weak layer just beneath the surface. The second photo is a closeup of the facets.
A full-depth profile on Showoff reveals several weak layers of faceted snow. If we get a real loading event, I will be giving these slopes a wide-berth until I see how these layers react to a new load.
The depth hoar at the base of this shallow snowpack is large, up to 6mm.
The RR layer is not a problem for now and the danger remains low. With a pattern change on the horizon, I'll be paying close attention to this layer if and when the snow starts stacking up.
