Observation 1/28/2023
Snow Observation
John’s Brook Valley
Observation Details
On the way up from the trail head we observed a rain crust off the trail up to about 3000’. As we skinned up the slide, we experienced occasional but heavy gusts of wind transporting minimal amounts of snow. There was a somewhat reactive wind drift layer from recent snowfall about 1-3cm thick varying throughout the slope. We did not experience any collapsing or signs of instability below the 1-3 inch layer and decided to dig a pit. The pit showed a 33cm snowpack with 3cm of 2F snow on top of 30cm fist snow. The ground was smooth frozen ice. We performed a column test which yielded a CT3 with a non-planar fracture. An Extended column test yielded no results (ECTX) so a PST was performed and yielded 15/30cm. There were some areas on the slope where the thin top layer was punchier than others. We jumped on a bunch of test slopes to test the reactivity and did not observe any signs of collapsing. As we made our way upslope, a deeper pocket shot about a 20cm crack along the top 3cm layer. No other signs of instability were observed.