Route:
Travel from 1,000′ to 2,500′ in the Tincan tree area near the CFR avalanche that
occurred yesterday.
Weather:
Storm day. Obscured skies and snowing 1″ per hour. Temps in the upper 20’s F and
winds light in the trees but blowing in the 20mph range at treeline from the
East.
Recent Avalanches:
None observed
Signs of instability:
Heavy snowfall
Moderate wind
One small localized collapse in the trees
Surface Conditions:
6″ of new medium density snow by 3:30pm
Snowpack:
Below 2,500′: (We stayed below treeline today due to the rising avalanche danger
and lack of visibility)
Total depth 2-3′
At 2,200′ the weak November facets still exist at the base of the snowpack (8-10″ thick).
There are a variety of crusts sandwiched in the facets. The slab is 18″ to 2′ thick
on top of the weak snow.
Other comments:
We ventured to the site of the CFR avalanche yesterday in hopes of locating a dog
that was buried in the slide as well as conducting additional snowpack assessments.
Despite a search dog finding an ‘area of interest’ and heavy snowfall/wind keeping
us off the upper elevations, we did not succeed in either one of these tasks today.