New Snow in Hyalite

We toured up to Mt Blackmore today and found that winter had returned to the high peaks over the last two days. Since yesterday morning, high elevations around Hyalite have received about 12" of new snow (1.2" SWE). The parking lot had around 3", the trail around 6" and at elevations above 8500' the numbers corresponded well to the Shower Falls SNOTEL.

The parking lot and lower trail softened up throughout the day and temperatures were above 32 degrees at the car at 3pm. In the alpine around 9800', temperatures were just below freezing (31 degrees) around 1pm. Despite our layers and gear getting a bit soggy, the snow from last night remained dry.

A mix of rimed precipitation particles and graupel fell throughout the day. Previous and current winds were calm; there was little to no wind effect on the new snow. we saw no cracking or recent drifts. The 12" of snow since yesterday fell right-side-up and had little to no slab properties. This new snow rests on a stout melt-freeze crust from the high temperatures last week.

Our main avalanche hazard today were dry-loose avalanches. Despite lots of traffic in this zone today, we only saw a handful of slides in steep terrain, and all were relatively small and did not entrain much snow. Conditions can and will change quickly if winds increase or the sun comes out and warms the new snow, but for now, we were happy to find good powder skiing.