Public Field Report

Observation Details

Signs of Unstable Snow

Observations

Clear skis all day. Moderate morning winds in the valley floor near the Copper Mountain parking lot and light winds the rest of the day.

We skinned up Molly's ridge up to the 7992' peak just south of Copper Mountain and skied a couple runs off the ridge on N/NW aspects.

Snow remained dry throughout the day on the N/NW aspects with light crusts directly under trees on the lower elevation W facing portions of the ridge. Observed almost no signs of wind loading along the ridge all the way to the 7992' peak - light wind texturing in a couple spots only. We traversed one SW 7100' aspect late in the afternoon and observed a softening sun crust on top of ~1" of wet snow. The rest of the snowpack there remained dry.

We observed no signs of instability the whole day and little signs of wind loading so we were comfortable skiing the ~33 degree N/NW aspects we had planned.