Snow report Ecrins, 12/06/2016

Snow condition

Closed snow cover from 2000 m on the north side. South side up to 2300 m open. Good piste conditions in les 2 Alpes. Off-piste, almost everything that was reasonably skiable is now tracked.

Snow quality

Cover on the south side. Powder snow and ripe surface on the north side. Pleasant to ski. The lower areas with less snow are teeming with sharks. Piste is more popular at the moment.

A snow profile at 2800 m, slope inclination 35 degrees, north-facing exposure towards Pic du Diable revealed an interesting structure:Surface rime (possibly niggle effect in the ridge area?)Underneath approx. 20 cm of loose, unbound powder.60 cm of compact, bound base underneathIcy hard layers underneath with a small amount of floating snow. Snow cover measures 120 cm in total. A sliding block test confirmed a fairly stable snowpack. The first layer of powder slides off quite easily, but the layers underneath are well bonded. An upper part of the early November snow was only able to slide off as a result of stronger forces (see photo)Conclusion: Surface rime occurs quite extensively on the north side and also in deeper layers. This could become a problem with new snowfall. Wind loads in ridge areas are about 1 week old. Releases could not be observed anywhere. In my opinion, the situation is relatively relaxed at the moment.

Overall impression

Weather day on the mountain to get ready for winter. Also interesting to see the changes in the snow cover over the last few days. I'm curious to see how new snowfalls will affect the current situation