[MCR] Evening Ridge, White Queen near Whitewater Ski Resort, Southern Se

Subject: [MCR] Evening Ridge, White Queen near Whitewater Ski Resort, Southern Selkirk Mountains
Date: Thu, 02 Jan 2014 22:22:51 -0800
Went for a ski tour in the Evening Ridge, White Queen area near Whitewater Ski Resort today. Temps were in the -5C range throughout the day, although may have warmed up a bit in the afternoon. Snowed lightly but steadily all day, perhaps a couple of cm accumulated while I was out. The winds were moderate (strong enough to blows some snow around) out of the south west. Some pockets of soft windslab were forming along the ridge tops above 1900m elevation.

I dug a pit on an open, east facing slope at 1900m. In it I found two layers that reacted with moderate to hard compression tests. One of them was the November 29 surface hoar layer which was down about 60cm. It failed with a sudden collapse quality, indicating in my mind it's still a concern on specific slopes. More loading from this storm and others could make avalanches fail on it more easily. The other layer, down about 25cm was another surface hoar layer which formed mid-late December. It too failed with a sudden collapse quality.

Another thing that concerned me was how weak the lower snowpack had become. I was in a place where the snowpack was shallower than the average for the area (about 110cm) due to wind scouring. When I stepped off my skis, a couple of times my feet plunged almost to the ground. The snow down there had become very faceted (sugary) - snow grains that don't stick together very well. I'm wondering how areas like this (shallow, weak snowpack) will react to additional loading from this and other storms.

Despite all this, I found the ski quality to be good, although the coverage is still not up to normal levels. I chose conservative lines: stayed off big open slopes, convex rolls, unsupported slopes and avoided the wind slabs near the ridge tops.

Craig Hollinger,
ACMG Assistant Ski Guide.
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