Photo 1: Strong wind was transporting snow and creating stiff, stubborn wind slabs on nownwind terrain, mostly north facing terrain.

Photo 2: Stout wind slab would crack but were stubborn

Photo 3 I was surprised to see fresh tracks descending this slope along with a climbing trail. The slope did not avalanche but it was exactly the kind of slope that that has been avalanching these past few days, steep, north facing, recently wind loaded.

Snow profie: This is a compilation of three different snow profiles I dug, two on west facing slopes near Scott's Hill and one on a north facing slope near Guardsman's Pass trailhead in the meadow by the creek. I was very surprised that I was not able to initiate nor propagate a collapse on the basal depth hoar near the ground. A couple weeks ago, the snow would easily collapse and propagate on the depth hoar. The snowpack is getting deeper with a stronger, stouter slab on top and the depth hoar layer has gained a lot of strength. Obviously, these snow profiles are not representative of the many avalanches we have seen these past few days with the big storm. Most of the avalanches were on upper elevation, steep, recently wind loaded slopes. All my profiles were in wind sheltered areas and on gentler slopes.