Observation: Moab

Observation Date:

12/21/2016

Observer Name:

Dave Garcia

Region:

Moab

Location Name or Route:

Laurel Highway/Gold's Basin

Weather

Sky:

Overcast

Wind Direction:

West

Wind Speed:

Light

Weather Comments:

Cloudy day in the mountains with warm temperatures. Temps were right around 32 F. Light winds from the west on the ridge tops and calm in the drainage bottoms.

Snow Characteristics

Snow Surface Conditions:

Dense Loose

Wind Crust

Melt-Freeze Crust

Snow Characteristics Comments:

Skied high elevation south facing today. Sadly it has formed a pretty stout sun crust. Yesterday it was high density surfy cream on this aspect and today very crusty (see photo).

Red Flags

Red Flags:

Poor Snowpack Structure

Red Flags Comments:

Dug on a north facing slope and found a slab on top of a weak layer, see below for details.

Avalanche Problem #1

Type:

Persistent Slab

Trend:

Same

Problem #1 Comments:

Dug a pit on a north facing slope, 33 degrees at about 10,900 ft. Total snow depth is 95 cm. The buried weak layer was found about 20cm below the surface at 75cm. Most likely buried surface hoar. The weak layer was easily revealed with a shovel shear. This layer failed in a compression test CT4 Q2. I conducted an extended column test with no results, ECTX. The shovel shear also revealed a weak layer at 47 cm but this layer did not fail in any tests. The weakness at 75cm is the layer to be most concerned about right now, and I will be watching it in the days to come.

Snow Profile

Aspect:

North

Elevation:

10900

Slope Angle: