Observation Date: 02/25/2019

Route/Location:
Lolo Pass: G-spot. Idaho/Montana Border

Weather:
Dumping and windy. Was out at same location yesterday and almost all tracks from the day before obliterated above the initial forest road travel. It looked wild out there. 10 cm (4″) of new light snow at trailhead.

Wind:
Winds constant around 20 mph. N-NW to SE. Sideways falling snow. Obvious wind transport occurring, wind pillows and drifts present. Some scoured slabs present on North aspects and pockets.

New Snow:

Avalanche Activity:
Storming steadily. Not sure how much but winter storm conditions. Shooting cracks with multiple remote triggers on rollers just skinning to our high point at 5500′.

Pit at 5500′, SE aspect. estimated 20 degree slope just under the road under the final pitch. Dug to 190cm arbitrarily:
CT1: 10cm: low density snow with poor bed surface and poor propagation (the layer remote triggering on our way up)
CT21: Dense snow layer down to around 40cm. Very clean bed surface. This seems like the nasty one if the current top layer continues to grow and manages to step down.

Performed ECT but unable to get propagation in the column.

Other Comments:
Shooting cracks throughout dry, low density powder anywhere from 1.5″ to 6″. Dry, light powder barely skiable on the low angles we were on. A lot of little patches sluffing off and making tree wells and terrain traps big issues.

Powder while coming down anywhere from mid thigh to above waist.

Observer: Casey Brown Brown