| Recent Avalanches? | Yes |
| Collapsing (Whumphing)? | No |
| Cracking (Shooting cracks)? | No |
Observation: Hatcher Pass
Location: Government Peak
Standard up track behind Skeetawk to explore an area we hadn’t been to in a while.
Obvious signs of instability
Observer Comments
No collapsing or whumphing observed. No shooting cracks observed. Could see recent avalanche- (2/18/23 WNW 3900' on Punk Spines).
Weather
Few clouds, no precip, no wind, 20 F @ 11:45 am
Scattered clouds, no precip, no wind, 21 F @ 12:25 pm
Broken clouds, no precip, no wind, 20 F @ 14:33 pm
Snow surface
Snow surface was smooth, not loaded. We observed a brittle but skiable thin surface sun crust at all elevations and surface hoar growing at all elevations in wind protected areas.
Snowpack
We did multiple ski pole probing tests on our skin track up. We were unable to probe to the bottom of the snowpack at the lower elevations because we were unable to probe through a hard layer roughly half way in the snowpack. We were able to probe to ground at the higher elevations.
Snow height on skin track at 3300' was ~15cm
Snow height on skin track at 3400' was ~35cm
We dug one pit at 3,685' on Government Peak on an east aspect at a 25 degree slope. Snow height was 78 cm. We found three MF crusts. We conducted two ECT tests. Our test results were ECTN7 roughly ~15cm down from the snow surface and ECTN13 roughly 35cm down from the snow surface. Reactivity was observed around the upper MF crust layers. We did not observe any propagation on our ECTs. We did observe depth hoar at the base of our snowpit.
Snowpit
Depth hoar cups
More depth hoar cups
Pit Location
Suncrust on the lower skin track
Kinco in surface hoar
Ridgeline