Unfortunately, we still need to be concerned about weak faceted snow layers deeper in the snowpack. These layers are still capable of producing dangerous avalanches on steep slopes that face west, north and east but especially northeast.

My partner and I were doing fieldwork around Huntington Canyon on Sunday and were still experiencing some collapsing (whumpfing) of the snowpack underneath us. This is a sure sign of unstable snow. The areas we were in are more shallow than a lot of areas on the Skyline. Shallow areas are almost always weaker areas. In places where it's deeper, we are probably not going to be seeing such obvious signs of unstable snow. But the faceted snow still remains and hasn't gained enough strength for me to trust getting into some of my favorite steeper terrain. The likelihood of triggering an avalanche is decreasing but the consequences remain the same.