da Whitefish Range

Today's goal was to run around south aspects in the Whitefish Range to search for buried weak layers. 

• We dug three quick pits on southeast, south, and west aspects. Found buried surface hoar on the southeast and west aspect. On the due south aspect, there was a layer of facets above some firm snow above the 1/13 crust.
• Snowpit test revealed unstable results on the southeast and west aspects. On a west aspect we had the block of snow propagate and slide into our lap on the 7th tap. 
• Both tests failed on buried surface hoar.

It is amazing how reactive this layer still is. I would also say that it appeared to be more pronounced in this location vs. a similar aspect in the Swan Range yesterday. It will pay to do your homework before committing to anything on south aspects. I'm writing off north and east aspects for some time still.