24-25

On Mar 14 A group of riders shared that they had triggered a 4' deep slide in a small pocket in Sunlight Basin of the Taylor Fork area. It was in an area with a relatively shallower snowpack, and broke on weak snow near the bottom of the snowpack. The rider that triggered it was going uphill and got stuck shortly after and noted the snowpack was much deeper there.

A group of riders saw Mark at the gas station and shared that they had triggered a 4' deep slide in a small pocket in Sunlight Basin of the Taylor Fork area. It was in an area with a relatively shallower snowpack, and broke on weak snow near the bottom of the snowpack. The rider that triggered it was going uphill and got stuck shortly after and noted the snowpack was much deeper there.

Near Cooke City on Mar 14 there was 6" of new snow and wind was calm, even along the ridge near regularly wind-loaded slopes, and there was no snow blowing off ridgelines. The photo shows a slope that normally receives a lot of wind effect, but the new snow is unaffected indicating the wind has been calm. Photo: GNFAC

Dug a pit on a northeast facing slope, 9300' (profile and pic attached) near Cooke City. Snow depth was 7-8 feet. 6" of new snow was right side up. Below the new snow was a soft (1F-) melt-freeze crust with soft decomposing and slightly faceted particles below. ECTN13 broke below the crust. Below that the snowpack was 1F to P+ hard and lacked weak layers. The Feb 4 dirt layer was clearly visible. Photo: GNFAC

Found 5-8” of fresh low-medium density snow. Triggered multiple small soft storm slabs/sluff which occurred on steeper slopes (40+ degrees). 
also noted an interesting crust overlaying a weaker layer that the new snow sat on. This crust wasn’t found everywhere, but just on the sides of rolls facing west or north west (between 9000’-9400’). When probed with a pole it sounded hollow. The crust was thick in nearly every place we found it and didn’t ever collapse under us, but it did shear in hand pits. A thin layer of graupel was also on top of this crust in some areas. 
other areas where this crust didn’t exist seemed to either not have refrozen completely before getting snowed on, or never got above freezing in the first place (high elevation north facing). In some areas the new snow bonded very well, in other areas it was easier to get it to sluff off the old crust. Attached is a quick photo of the crust location and the weak snow below it.