Went for another trip through Cardiff via Alta and exiting out BCC, snow was damp and saturated up to a little under 9,000ft, it also had a fairly thick rain crust up to that elevation. Above that elevation there was about 1 inch of really dense snow on top which was being moved around and slabbed up by the wind. decided to dig a quick pit on the back side of Cardiff Peak about 10'100ft N facing, pit consisted of about 18 to 20 inches of facets in varying degrees of maturity the largest and loosest at the ground interface. I could still find the old rime crust but it has broken down and about disappeared in that location, this is all capped off by a dense 2 inch wind slab formed last night and this morning. Upon isolation it failed in the large grain facets at the ground interface. Skiing down the sub ridge on the way to Cardiac Ridge we released a few wind slabs in steeper terrain that also failed on the large grain facets at the ground interface. Whole different deal on Cardiac Ridge, not nearly as wind affected and lacking new wind slabs it was not cracking near as much as the N facing Pole Line ridge. The set up on the E facing ridge is 1 to 2 inches of new dense snow on top of lighter density faceting snow sitting on the stout wind slab-crust from Thanksgiving with dry facets underlying that. The snow pack on the ridge has also shrunk because of the warm temps and new dense snow. Skiing was kinda punchy at best.

Photos: Winds slab breaking into large grain facets, Quick pit with the large grain facets at the bottom and the decaying rime crust, the failure in the pit on isolation of the column, you can also see the rime crust in the photo, large grain facets at the ground, Stout rain crust found below 9,000ft, wind slabs on the ridge, and some sub par skiing.

Quite a mixed bag out there, I would think anything under 9,000ft is saturated and damp and in the low category, there might be a few booby traps on high N facing steep terrain with the dense wind slab on facets set up which is a fairly small piece of the pie, but with more weight predicted for later in the week all bets are off.