Wet snow and rime crust on Andesite Peak

Conditions on Andesite Peak were warm and rapidly becoming wet this morning as expected. Snowmelt was raining off of the trees when I started skinning at 9:15 am. A one inch thick surface crust was evenly distributed across all aspects and appeared to have formed out of a rime event late in yesterday's storm event. This crust had already melted in areas of full sun exposure on S aspects by 9:30 am. In shaded areas this crust existed all the way up to the summit at 8,219'.

As the surface crust melted, this left behind surface wet snow on top of dense recent storm snow. Ski penetration was around 8 inches or so where the crust had melted. Boot penetration was around 40 cm.

As the morning hours progressed, surface wet snow became increasingly widespread with roller balls and pinwheels easy to trigger. Off of the summit at about 10:35 am, I was able to trigger a pinwheel that approached 3 feet in diameter. Conditions were prime for wet loose avalanches.

Descending and avoiding avalanche terrain, the mix of surface wet snow and heavy, dense recent storm snow made for deep wet snow skiing.

A drive by down the E side of Donner Pass/Old Hwy 40 revealed numerous size D1 natural wet loose avalanches that had occurred this morning in addition to many that had occurred yesterday. Photo in separate observation.