New Crust Day

Went to the Swan Range to check on the wet snow hazard. We found it at lower elevations. Above there we found a whole lot of crust.

• The morning started warm and sunny. Wet snow under foot had obviously not refrozen overnight. Our skis sank to our boot tops in the glop. We noticed a lot of roller balls from yesterday on steep slopes and all aspects we traveled below 5,500'. We could still trigger rollers on all aspects at lower elevations late this afternoon.
• We ascended a west-facing ridge and started to notice that the snow getting crusty by about 5,000'. That was likely the overnight freezing level.
• As we climbed into the middle elevation band around 11:30, cloud cover increased and so did a cool south wind.
• The rest of the day was dominated by a stout crust that we found on every aspect and elevation above about 5,400'. We suspect the freezing rain that had recently left a crust in the southern Whitefish Range visited the Swan Range too.
• We noticed no loose wet activity on steep southwest slopes from Monday or today, just some roller balls. Our guess is that the crust already existed before Monday's warm up and limited wet snow on all but the lowest elevation (warm) or sunniest slopes.
• We found low-density dry snow under the crust at upper elevations and on northerly slopes. We saw huge, looming cornices perched above steep terrain. Those may be key observations if the rest of the week gets as sunny and warm as is forecast.
• We found the mid-January crust buried deeply in the Central Swan: between 4 and over 6 feet deep.

The skiing was downright dangerous, because of the shin-breaker crust. We made nothing but kick turns. But the good news is we have a new crust we can talk about!