Weather and Snowpack Observation

My International Alpine Guides/ AIARE Level 1 course was out today on Castle.

We experieced the following weather from 0800 to 1500

Air Temps from -3C to -2C

Sky Cover from Few @0800 to Overcast @1100

Precip from None @0800 to S-1 @1400

Winds from Calm @0800 to Light out of the South West @1400

We witnessed no blowing snow

No signs of unstable snow nor any red flag weather observations

In our Test Profile (location pinned above) we were able to identify 2 major instances of strong over weak layering @59cm and 41cm. 

Test results:

CTMPC @59cm

ECTN18 @59cm

Under magnification the deeper (41cm and below) facet layer shows strong visual indication of rounding as well as liquid water within

Temperature reading taken at this layer indicated a gradient of less than 1C/10cm