Today we found the snow on shaded aspects still frozen and the layers below the top 5 cm solidly frozen even on the sunny slopes, but the sunniest aspects had a layer of corn snow that made for smooth and consistent afternoon skiing. Some slopes in the ski area were thawing and softening, too. The soft layer remains shallow, not yet deep enough to edge a snowmachine, and the slopes that are still frozen require careful travel and terrain choice.

We did do a profile today. The frozen melt freeze layer was 60 cm of very hard digging before we hit thawed and soft wet melt freeze snow below. Our AK Block on a 40° SW aspect at 720 m (2360') did not fracture at all, even when two testers took off their skis and jumped on it together.

The frozen faceted melt freeze layer from 75 to 135 cm is so strong that avalanche danger is minimal until it thaws or until new snow on top of it produces instability.