Public Observation

Observation Details

Observations

Toured near Chicken Wing today. At 9100' on a 330 deg aspect in moderately spaced trees on a very small ridge-like feature, I found a patch of unstable snow under my skis. The overlying (and very small) slab was composed of 4-5" of fist hard new snow on top of a 1-4" pencil hard wind deposit. When I skied over it, the "slab" sheared very cleanly (Q1) on the interface with 4F+ near surface facets. The near surface facets were at least a foot deep (that's as far as I dug with my hand). I was surprised by how clean the shear and touchy the interface was. Despite the low angle of the terrain, the pieces of the small slab still slid downhill quite easily. Other than that, no signs of instability today. I had some nice ankle deep turns in the square pow but had to be on my toes, as the sharks are hiding just under the new snow surface waiting to feast on metal and ptex.

Signs of Unstable Snow