Tunnel Ridge Wx Station Mission

Today we teamed up with the BNSF Avalanche Safety Program to troubleshoot problems with the Tunnel Ridge Weather Station.

• Roughly a foot of snow exists at 5000 feet. There is approximately 6 inches of cohesionless snow sitting on a supportable crust. This crust extends up to ~6000 feet.
• Above 6000 feet the snowpack quickly gained depth to 1 to 2.5 feet of snow depending on the aspect. 
• We noted many start zones above 6500 feet were stripped by strong north and east winds from last week. This creates a few forecasting problems:
  • Shallower snow means weaker snow with these cold temperatures. This will only be a problem once this snow is buried by enough new snow to form a slab. 
  • Some start zones are shallow and rocky right now, while others of similar aspects are not (this is a result of localized channeling of strong winds). This creates a highly variable snowpack and can make forecasting (persistent slabs in particular) more challenging. 
• We had good views of the alpine and observed no recent avalanche activity.
• We observed no shooting cracks, felt no collapses and observed no slabs of drifted snow. The only wind-affected snow we observed was scoured start zones.  
• The snowpack is quickly faceting and becoming cohesionless. 

Due to structural damage, Tunnel Ridge is temporarily out of service for an undetermined amount of time. We will do the best we can to get it up and running again. A big thanks to Adam and the BNSF Avalanche Safety Program for your time, expertise, and help with this project.