Snow report Stubai Valley, 01/17/2021

Snow condition

The snow conditions are still great all the way down to the Stubai Valley. Even in the dense forest you can get down without touching the ground, pillows and similar features can all be jumped without hesitation. Only in the denser forest below approx. 1400 m does it get a little more difficult.

Snow quality

Nice powdery fresh snow and not too little of it. Could hardly be better, but it wasn't wild snow today :DThe last two snowfalls on Tuesday and Thursday brought about 60cm of fresh snow at an altitude of 1900m, and certainly a bit more in places. It snowed lightly all day today too.

The LWD issues a 4 for the region above 1600m. We only ventured up to the tree line and stayed in denser, somewhat flatter forest. A snow slab was visible on a slope, which had probably already fallen during the snowfall, and we dug a snow profile at the edge of the forest and made an ECT (altitude 1900m, exposure east, approx. 25 degrees). A fracture could only be created at this point with a large additional load and broke between the old snow and the fresh snow from Tuesday. I was on tour on Friday and found a much more critical situation in similar terrain (forest edge at approx. 1700m) on the Nordkette (settling noises, crack formation with large crack propagation even in flat terrain). The fracture there occurred within the fresh snow that fell on Thursday and the snow cover may have stabilized somewhat since Friday. However, this is only my personal assessment of today compared to the situation on Friday, which is still a tense situation as the current LWD and the many avalanches of the last few days show. Due to today's fresh snow plus wind, caution is still advisable.

Overall impression

One of the best treerun days I've ever had!
I've rarely skinned up 3 times in one day for the same run. Beautiful snow, perfect sinking depth and a well-suited forest (not too steep and not too shallow, not too dense and not too light) made today really fun. And in contrast to the silt yesterday, it was also considerably less stressful.