Monitoring Persistent Slab Problem on Silver Peak

We made observations in the Pole Creek/Silver Peak area today.  We headed here after hearing reports of previous widespread avalanche activity in this area.  We were able to see lots of avalanches and investigate some of them.  We found that many of these avalanches failed on the Dec 8 buried surface hoar layer and not the deeper Dec 1 persistent weak layer.  We did some digging in one of the avalanche crowns and found the buried surface hoar to be not reactive with an ECTX result.  Small roller balls were forming on S-SE aspects with warming conditions and a developing sun skin.  No other current signs of instability were found today.