Sounds a bit like our snowpack!

We headed into the Salmon Headwaters area yesterday to see how conditions are faring where the snowpack is a bit deeper. At upper elevations, we found the weak faceted snow was buried 2.5 to 3 feet deep – which is about a foot deeper than in the North Wood River Valley. The thicker slab in our deeper snowpack areas, which also include the Sawtooths and Soldier mountains, is a mixed blessing. The weight of nearly 3 feet of snow is finally causing the sugary facets to show some signs of consolidation, and during stability tests it takes quite a bit of effort to get the facets to fail. But when they do go, they still shear very cleanly and tests show the ability to propagate a fracture. What this tells me is that the likelihood of triggering a slide is decreasing, but if you were to trigger something it would be large and dangerous. Under these conditions, an avalanche would likely be triggered from a shallower area, so you’ll want to be very cautious on any steeper slope with thin or rocky areas. The additional snowfall in this region is also making surface hoar layers buried 1-2 feet deep a concern, and it’s possible to trigger an avalanche on these layers as well.

From the Sawtooth Avy center Today.

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Toby