Greetings everyone,
Spent Wednesday to Friday skiing in Rogers
Pass – first 2 days up at
Asulkan hut and Friday up Connaught Ck..
There has been significant snowfall since last weekend –
the valley bottoms trails have 30-60cms. of coverage – once you are above
1800m. the depth increases significantly averaging between 100-140cm. between
1800 and 2100m. – I didn’t get much higher than that so no real
info on the alpine other than there has been significant wind events with these
last storms and so windslabs are likely in exposed or lee terrain.
You can now ski from the parking lots (if only barely) but
the descent trails are a bit sporty with low snowcover and numerous early
season hazards.
Snowpack above 1800m. shows a multi-layered crust with @ 50
to 100 cms. of snow over it – the snow below the crust is moist (almost
wet) as is the snow just above the crust – things seem well bonded to the
crust with no clean shears in any of my tests – I did find a moderate
Compression Test down 60cm from the surface but it was not very clean (CTM 18
RP – this means Compression test moderate on 18th hit with a
resistant planar shear). There was also a second easy shear 15cm. from surface
where the snow surface had been affected by the wind.
No significant avalanche activity to be observed but all
days were poor visibility with limited observations.
Things are skiable but remember that there are numerous
early season hazards out there so bringing your brain bucket for the ride out
the trail might not be a bad idea – I would also suggest that the alpine
should be treated with caution until more is known about the crust/storm snow
interface in that elevation band it could be quite different from what I
observed lower down.
Happy Trails,
Scott Davis
Mountain Guide