Mixed bag out there, but the best news was the winds appeared to be smoothing out the old "hammered" snow surfaces and erasing many of the old ruts and tracks. Light transport was observed, and wind slabs and crusts were evident and building small manageable drifts in isolated terrain features well below the classic upper elevation starting zones. Still some patches of dense settled old snow that rode well in NSF's that were up to 4 inches deep in the most sheltered undisturbed terrain, yet the majority of good riding of this nature was shallower and only 2 inches deep. Crusts from the past weeks warm weather on Southerly aspects. No SH observed, it appeared that the winds destroyed this potential issue in many locations
See above and photo, shallow isolated wind slabs from cross and top loading on mid elevation terrain features. Mostly stubborn and unreactive, yet some were falling on weak surface snow. For Thursday, any areas receiving even light winds could see sensitive new wind slabs developing with the new light density snow available for transport.
Light density new snow sitting on potential weak surface snow and surface crusts may yield fast running loose dry avalanches/sluffing in very steep terrain, mostly on E, N and W aspects that had old snow before this latest event.
