ferniesnow
I'm doo-ing it!
- Joined
- Dec 2, 2008
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- Location
- beautiful, downtown Salmon Arm, BC
On the eastern slope or the west facing slope on the east side of Highway #43 there is an interesting snow pack. A great base for early season and deep snow. I dug a pit today on a south facing aspect at 5500' and where we dug it there was 120 cm. On the ground was sugar and/or rotten snow for about 4 cm up. Then there was a very consolidated layer (I have never cut snow as hard as this was today) 96 cm on top of the rotten snow. A 2-3 cm rain crust was on top of the consolidated snow with 20 cm of "storm snow" sitting on the top of maybe a sun crust or thin rain crust. The results of a compression test were interesting. The storm snow separated with two easy taps. The consolidated 96 cm of snow broke at the ground with 4 medium taps on the shovel. The tower was solid and did not break as it hit the ground. It would appear that slab avalanches with be in order and the slabs may be very thick.
Be safe out there and don't get fooled into thinking there isn't enough snow to have an avalanche. Ride safe and be careful of the wind loaded slopes.
Be safe out there and don't get fooled into thinking there isn't enough snow to have an avalanche. Ride safe and be careful of the wind loaded slopes.