Public Observation

Observation Details

Observations

I toured up to South Lake today to see what kind of snow conditions the recent wind event had left behind. Travel went well, as a SCE snowcat had driven the route up to the dam this morning, but breaking trail in the variable wind crusts was otherwise frustrating, as I found when I reached the lake and toured around the basin.
There was certainly evidence of the strong winds, with anything near a N-NW aspect holding a supportable, mostly unbreakable 5-15cm wind board. That wind board was definitely sitting on top of loose winter snow, but multiple hand pits showed no signs of planar failure between the wind crust and the softer snow below it.
On the S-SE aspects, there was some minimal sculpting but little sign of wind loading, at least at the lower elevations around the basin. I didn't get up high enough to look at many ridgelines and peaks for cornices or leeward slab deposition, but I did observe a natural D2 release below an obviously loaded and heavily corniced East facing cirque on Table Mountain, visible from the Tyee Lakes trailhead.
Ohterwise, the lower angle and lower elevation S and SE faces seemed to generally have a softer, right side up snow surface, with 10-20cm of sun baked powder on top of a very firm base.

Observed Avalanches

Signs of Unstable Snow