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The
Week in Review
Aside
from a cold day of snow (2-3” accumulations up high)
and wind (westerly gusts from 50 – 70 mph) on 4/13, weather
conditions have
been warm and relatively calm.
Several
freeze thaw temperature cycles have continued to
occur near treeline, allowing the existing snowpack to settle (e.g.,
12” of
settlement occurred at Bear Lake) and water ice to form at higher
altitudes.
The
consolidation process is well under way on snowy alpine
aspects exposed to the sun.
However, for
times when the duration and magnitude of overnight freezes were minimal
or
absent, wet slab instability was a risk during the peak solar hours of
the
following day.
The
climatological peak in the snowpack water content typically
occurs in the subalpine and alpine regions around the end of April. To
date, the snowpack at Bear
Lake
is about 67% of the average annual peak.
In
comparison, the west side of the Park, near the Never Summer, is
about 70% of the average peak, and lower Wild Basin is about 115% of
its annual
max (owing to some well positioned easterly upslope events).
A
look at the current snowpack water content across the
higher elevations of the entire western US
reveals the classic El-Nino precipitation signature: wet conditions
across the
southwest and dry conditions across the northern Rockies.
And although it's unrelated to the weather, Eli adds that it's been a great couple of weeks of climbing at Lumpy Ridge, with a number of first ascents completed.
More importantly, the ticks are mad this month.
Most days at Lumpy these last few weeks, I've been coming home with between 6 and 10 ticks that are found in the ensuing hours- beware the beasties!
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