Professional Observation

Observation Details

Signs of Unstable Snow

Snow Stability

Key Points

I explored in the June Mountain backcountry today to see how much new snow actually fell from the inside slider storm yesterday. The storm totals from some of the nearby weather stations did not sound promising with 1.4 ” of new snow. However, June Mountain scored in this last storm.

• HS at 9808′ on an E aspect above Glass Creek 230 cm.
• In this spot I measured 25 cm of F soft wind deposited new snow  over a 3 cm P hard crust that sat on 45 cm of F hard facets. This is an area where wind deposits snow.
• I found a continuous blanket of new snow amounts ranging from 10 cm on the low end to 45 cm at the high end BTL and NTL. This was in lee aspects to the N winds. NE-E- SE-S-SW.
• I stomped on as many steep rollovers with newly wind deposited snow as I could and did not see a single shooting crack or other signs of instability. This is near tree line. I did not get to any of the start zones in terrain up higher.
• Active wind transport of snow at ridge top locations NTL and ATL.
• SE aspect at 1030: Hot pow that skied pretty well but developed a crust later in the afternoon. We also bottomed out on the turns on the hard sun crust underneath the new snow in this aspect.
• E and NE aspects had deeper new snow amounts in sheltered lee locations with soft old snow underneath. ( up to 20 cm new)