Surface Faceting and Surface Hoar In Johnson Canyon

Spent the day doing rescue and observations with our AIARE 1 class today, temps stayed cooler than expected in the canyon than expected with cloud cover increasing throughout the day, winds remained calm. Our biggest note of the day was well developed surface hoar and surface facets in sheltered NW-N-NE terrain below treeline, as well as near crust facets under the early Jan rain crust. While this area is prone to be on the colder side due to inversions, it is still creating weak layers on the surface that could be representative of other areas in the 7000'-8000' range and create failure layers whenever a precipation event returns to our region.