Observation: Summit

Beautiful day for a tour. On the way up we observed cracking around the turns
of two people who had skied the slope since the last storm. Near the top of
Manitoba on a west-facing slope that measured 24 degrees, we dug both a single
and extended column test pit. During the single column test, the most recent
storm layer came loose from the older facets on the fourth tap. On the extended
column test, this same top layer did not propagate past the edge of the shovel.
Lastly, I jumped on the snow above the column. Cracks shot straight down to
the dirt, and the whole thing came loose, which was a bit surprising. But we
couldn’t make anything move on the way down, even on rollovers, and saw no
cracking as we broke new track. We didn’t notice any unusual wind loading
either, the pack up there seemed fairly straight forward. The snow was incredible!