Winter Reset

After being out of town last weekend, I was able to get out for a quick ski dawn ski tour this morning.  

I'm really not sure what to make of the past couple of weeks and current state of the snowpack. Alta is reporting 69" of snow so far this season, which is likely an upper mountain measurement taken at the Collins observing site.  The Alta COOP site in town and about 1000 feet lower has recorded 48.5 inches.

On the south aspects, most of this snow is gone.  Photo below taken this morning from the lower slopes of the "Collins glacier."  Apologies for the thumb, but it's precarious to take a photo there if you don't have crampons on.  The glacier is down to firn. 

There have also been significant loses on slopes with western exposures.  

I like to tell my students that all generalizations are wrong.  Saying the ski season is off to a good start is such a generalization.  Much depends on altitude aspect. For early November, we're off to a good start on northerly aspects above 9000 feet.  Elsewhere, it's pretty much a reset of winter, as the warm spells, sun, and rain have done their damage. Snow is either nonexistent or sparse.  It's hard to build a snowpack in those areas in October if you can't sustain the snowfall or the cold.  

Additionally, although it's been snowy, the average temperature at the Salt Lake City airport from 15 October to 5 November was 51.3˚F. In 148 years of records, that ranks as the 38th warmest.  Not exceptional, but that's close to in the top 25% warmest.  

Getting back to skiing, my early morning start reflected my need to work this weekend.  I'm in the office now trying to keep my head above water.  Perhaps things will soften this afternoon, but this morning, as I suspected would be the case, instead of chin ticklers there were bone rattlers.  My teeth still hurt.  

The contrast between above and below the angle station remains quite apparent and this reflects recent storms that have occasionally pushed the snow level to 9000ish feet.  Corkscrew, pictured below, reminded me of skiing on runs without snowmaking in upstate NY when I was a kid.  

 Loose and frozen granular, 2-6 inch base.