Observation type
Snowpack
Observer
Allen Giernet
Keep me anonymous if published
no
Location (general area)
Mt. Baden Powell north face
Date (yyyymmdd)
20130303
Time
1:30pm
Road conditions to area
clear and dry
Temperature
2°c
Sky
Broken clouds (4/8 but not all)
Wind speed
Moderate (17-25mph Small trees sway/ flags stretched)
Wind direction
NW
Slope aspect
North
Slope angle
38°
Elevation
8900'
Snow depth
30cm
Boot/ Ski penetration
1.5cm
Precipitation
None
Activity, recent avalanches
yes
Brief description
two wet slides on NW aspect about 7000'+ at least a day or two old
Whumphing noises, shooting cracks, collapsing
no
Rapid warming
yes
Obvious avalanche path
no
Terrain trap
yes
Comment
Wet slides were observed on the drive to parking on the NW aspect of the drainage above the parking area approximately at 7000' probably a day or two old

Snow varied on climb up from thin crusty on ice. At about 7500' coverage became more consistent and deeper with crusty snow on facets. Looked like a slab turning into a melt freeze layer due to the recent warming.

At 8500' or so snow was deeper and had some areas of soft snow in sheltered treed areas with hard crusts interspersed. with more depth there was a definite wind slab consolidating on facets that were on a crust then solid snow below (just did a couple of quick hand pits here)

There were sings all over the slope of wind loading in various areas and wind crusts in others. Wind slabs had developed on mostly northern aspects but were not restricted to those areas as the wind had obviously been influenced by the terrain. In the main drainage I saw at least one loose snow slide very small observed from a distance.

At 8900' area noted above we were in a clearing with a pretty solid melt freeze crust slab on top. here is the profile from top down: 
30cm deep
4cm 1F slab melt freeze 1.5mm rounding grains
7cm 4F Facets 2mm 
.5cm ice crust
18cm 4F facets 2mm+ 
1 cm ice at bottom

Temp profile:
surface 0°c
10cm ⇓ -2°c
20cm ⇓ -2.5°c
ground 0°c

1 stability test - ECT X
Was barely able to get a chunk to move while prying hard with the shovel.

I did not have time to perform test in another area.

At 2:15pm on the way down around 7500' we initiated a couple of small wet slides on a due north aspect in a treed area. Obviously due to the rapid warming during the day these did not run very far mostly due to the fairly dense trees and ran on facets under the newer snow on a bed surface of the melt freeze about 4" to 6" down. 
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