Wind slabs in Hope Valley

I toured around Red Lake Peak and Stevens Peak on Tuesday, 3/7, and observed recent natural wind slab avalanches, lots and lots of blowing snow, shooting cracks on wind-loaded slopes, and reactive wind-loaded test slopes. The most notable avalanche I observed was a natural at the pin location, on a NE aspect at 8700' on the NE Ridge of Red Lake Peak (photo 1). It was difficult to make out the crown and debris, but it appeared to be D2 R3 and to have slid sometime overnight or early in the morning. 

As we toured up the NE ridge and around Crater Lake, I saw many shooting cracks, both with and without being undercut by the skin track. Photos 2 and 3 were taken on a NE-facing test slope right at the SW edge of Crater Lake proper, where I was able to trigger the small ~14" wind slab avalanche. 

Touring over to the mid-elevation slopes of Stevens Peak in the afternoon, we observed debris on the NE slope of Pt. 8806' on the E Ridge of Stevens. The light was quite poor (as is photo 4), so it was hard to make out the extent of the avalanche, but it appeared to be a shallow but somewhat wide wind slab that had failed naturally during the previous 24 hours. 

Winds were generally out of the west, southwest, or south, depending on terrain, and were consistently strong to extreme in exposed areas. We were able, however to find some protection on the lee side of terrain features and in the trees below Crater Lake, and the snow quality aligned with that. Sastrugi and other wind-affected snow was widespread in the near-treeline terrain of the zone, but the lower portion of the Crater Lake Bowl and the exit gully from the NE Bowl of Stevens held good, protected powder snow, as did the trees below. 

Cloud cover ebbed and flowed from broken to overcast, with intermittent periods of filtered sun shining through, and light to very light snow fell throughout the day.