Vert-to-go

Status check for the near-surface snowpack in the northern Flathead Range. 

• Snow showers (S-1 to S2) before and during our excursion deposited about 3" of new snow at mid elevations. This snow was moist below about 5200 feet this afternoon and sitting on melt-freeze crusts. It was mostly dry above that elevation and sitting on several inches of hard wind board on easterly slopes and several inches of recent snow on northerly slopes. 
• Winds were calm to light, with only a slight amount of drifting on a mid-elevation ridge.
• The new snow on a very steep, northerly test slope sluffed easily, though it didn't entrain any older snow. D1.
• The only cracking I observed came when I cut through the sluff debris; that debris was enough to stiffen the near-surface snow into a soft slab and prorduce a crack about a ski-length long (the width of the debris)
• The recent snow covers older, drifted snow that was hard (1F-1F+) and about 25 cm thick. This layer did not produce sudden failures in a test profile at 6500 feet on a northern slope, and didn't react to ski cuts. 
• The basin filled with clouds early afternoon, and the poor visibility made for some tricky skiing at mid elevations. Clouds were broken with better visibility at the ridgeline. 
• At low elevations, the near-surface snow is melt-freeze grains, frozen hard this morning and softer but still supportable in the PM. A few rollerballs of wet snow ran on steep slopes.
• We crossed or crossed under the debris from several large wet loose slides that ran in the past two days (avalanche details tab; image).