Recent heavy snowfall and wind transport
Observation: Douglas Island
Location: Fish Creek Knob shoulder
We went up wedding bowl to the shoulder of fish creek knob above boulder chute with a JMR crew.
Observer Comments
Weather
Temps high 20s/low 30s, snowed throughout the day, winds SE ~10-20.
We have had heavy precip and high winds in the last few days, culminating with 90mph gusts at eaglecrest (182 on sheep!) and freezing levels above 3000' Friday night, then cooling early Saturday morning.
Snow surface
Breakable crust with heavy snow beneath. Fresh snow began falling mid morning and drifted over our tracks in the time it took to dig
Snowpack
We did two snow assessments around 2400' on windward and leeward aspects. Both pits contained 3 crust layers that will be worth tracking when we eventually start wanting to step out into bigger terrain:
The surface Jan 20 rain crust may become a problem as more snow accumulates on top of it.
A ~50cm deep crust was somewhat stubborn to trigger and did not propagate in either ECT, though fractures were planar.
A thicker crust 85-100cm down was quite stubborn to trigger with column tests but also yielded planar breaks.
Leeward pit: N aspect, 30 degrees, 285cm snow depth, 180 cm pit depth
ECTN23 @ 25cm , ECTN26 @ 45cm, ECTN30 @ 55cm, CT13 @ 15cm CT22 @ 45cm, CT29 @ 85cm
Windward pit S aspect, 24 degrees, 250cm snow depth, 180 cm pit depth. We were surprised that the snow depth was so high on the windward slope. Snow here felt denser than on the North aspect.
ECTN13 @ 15cm, ECTN27 @ 50cm, CT13@ 15cm, CT19 @ 50cm.
North aspect pit
South aspect column test
Shoulder taps on 50cm layer
50cm and 100cm layers.