Wind slabs and no results on buried surface hoar layers on Mt. Judah.

We toured Mt. Judah today to assess the stability of buried surface hoar and to look at newly formed wind slabs.

We dug four snowpits on N to ENE aspect slopes in the 7,500' to 7,800' elevation range, two of which were near recent avalanches. In three of the four snowpits, we found the recently problematic surface hoar layer. We performed numerous ECTs and one PST, none of which gave indications of continued instability. We had hoped to get at least one snowpit in the crown or flank of a recent avalanche but were unable to do so due to hangfire.

We saw large, overhung cornices along Wildflower Ridge and along the summit ridge of Mt. Judah. These cornices may fail naturally later this weak if significant warm occurs.

We avoided the areas of largest wind slab below the overhung cornices, but were able to test some of the smaller wind slabs at the edges. We intentionally triggered via ski cut one 4 inch thick wind slab on a test slope at the N end of Wildflower Ridge.

Despite the cloud cover and very occasional, short lived sun breaks between snow showers, solar radiation was warming the snow surface on all aspects including N. Skier triggered roller balls occurred on all aspects, but much more so on E aspects than N aspects.