Detailed Observation

Date2020-01-17
LocationHaines
ObserverErik Stevens
AvalancheN

General Observations

Observations from 3000ft in the Jones Gap area: Beautiful day out in the cold wintery world. Ski quality moderately good in protected pockets in the basin. 

Snowpack: Midpack is rock-hard refrozen in most areas, but we were able to find some higher slopes near 3000ft where that midpack bridge was weak, facetted, and prone to punching through to facets underneath. This seemed most common around trees/rocks. Above the midpack, main concern was recent wind slabs/rime crusts sitting over facets about 30cm deep. This layer was weak enough for human triggering: shooting cracks and whumphs were common. Due to this layer, we aborted skiing a very tempting 35-degree east aspect that was holding good pow.

Lots of surface and near-surface facets out there, will be nasty weak layers once buried by the next storm. 

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Weather Observations

Observed Avalanche Activity