Blue skies and warm temperatures hovering around freezing at upper elevations and well above freezing at the road elevation. Light winds along the ridge line in the afternoon were keeping things relatively cool in the alpine.
Observation: Turnagain
Location: Sunburst
Headed up the normal skin track looking for corn skiing conditions. The crust softened in the afternoon but stayed supportable on S and SE aspects. We left at 4pm and the crust at lower elevations was still supportable for a skier, but it was melting fast with the warm and sunny weather.
Weather
Snow surface
Below 1500' the W aspect we skinned up had a very supportable 6"+ thick melt freeze crust. Above 1500' the thickness of the surface crust was very aspect dependent. On northerly aspects below roughly 2200' there was a thin surface crust, but above 2200' northerly aspects had dry and light facets on the surface.
Snowpack
We did not dig any formal snow pits.
1-2" thick crust on a west aspect at about 2000'.
Quite a few wet loose avalanches underneath Tincan Proper and the Library.
Three new wet loose avalanches on SE aspects along Seattle Ridge that likely occurred on Thursday.
Close up of largest wet debris pile on Seattle ridge, which is from two different avalanches that released a few days apart.
Large wet snow debris pile underneath Penguin Ridge near Girdwood.
Dry snow is holding on on northern aspects above 2500', with a few roller balls from the morning sun on this NE aspect.