We were back up in the Northern Bear River Range today, and dug an avalanche pit on an east-northeast facing slope at about 8,900 feet. The slope was around 30 degrees,
We found a total snow depth of about 62 inches, with 18 inches of new snow since the rain event on Sunday. That new snow rode sooo good—really deep powder and fantastic conditions.
Below that 18 inches of fresh snow, we had about a quarter-inch rain crust from Sunday, sitting on top of around 5 inches of older snow from that same morning. Under that was another foot of snow from about a week ago, and then a big 8 to 10-inch rain crust from earlier in December. Down near the ground, there were a few older layers as well.
Test Results: Our shovel shear tests did show a pretty decent shear at the interface about 18 inches down, right above the ice crust from Sunday. Compression tests got interesting: we had failures at 4 and 8 taps about 8 inches down (likely a weak layer from overnight graupel), then at 11 and 16 taps on top of the Sunday crust, and finally at 25 and 26 taps on a weak interface layer about 24 inches down. We also saw a failure right at the ground during isolation, but with over 5 feet of snow on top, that’s not something we’re too worried about from a human-trigger perspective.
The extended column test was a bit of a surprise: we got failures in the same layers, but nothing propagated. That’s good news in terms of stability, even though we did see multiple layers of concern.
PSA: Riding conditions were fantastic overall—deep powder and really fun out there. We did trigger a couple of small soft slab avalanches on steep 40-degree rollovers (see picture), mostly on that 8-inch down weak layer. They propagated about 25 feet wide in spots, but nothing too major. We also had a bit of rime around mid-day that coated goggles and trees but didn’t affect the snow surface much. Also, there was a lot of wind through the day from the Northwest. It was blowing hard in the bottom of the canyons significantly affecting the snow surface. However, along the ridges, we didn't notice the wind too much (interesting...). I am sure there are some large wind slabs forming ins places so watch for it.
Just be aware that lower elevations (below about 7,500 feet) are getting pretty wet by afternoon, so conditions could change quickly down low.
