Fresh snow and poor visibility
13th March 2023
(Above) Looking west along the main Coire Ardair path towards the upper end of Coire Ardair. 5cm of undrifted fresh snow on the path at 570m this afternoon. Snow line early doors was 450m. Visibility was, well, poor. All day. Not quite the full ‘white room’ experience near the plateau, but close!
(Above) Camera phone pano shot of South to West aspects in Coire Chriochairein. (South-facing is +/- the centre of the photo with West-facing aspects on the far right.) Developing cover of fresh snow in front of the camera… but I wouldn’t be prepping your skis for an outing here just yet! Yes, there was some drifting up high but quite a lot of the cold dry snow was simply airborne and not predisposed to drift. Windslab accumulations tended to be quite soft and moderately bonded in lee areas up near the plateau’s edge, and formed more or less exclusively on top of bare ground.
Very cold temperatures in prospect over the forthcoming 24hrs.
Comments on this post
Got something to say? Leave a comment
Stan Wygladala
13th March 2023 9:19 pm
That’s more like it.
Are you referencing Cream, the White Room, or was that a coincidence. I doubt it!
I once had to undergo white out conditions training which involved wearing a bucket on my head while being roped to three other idiots, similarly equipped. Funnily enough this did stimulate the true conditions as I found out “ way down south”. Classified info on details.
meagaidhadmin
13th March 2023 9:46 pm
No, not a Cream reference, or at least not an intentional one!
Re. The bucket method. Intriguing training technique that, Stan.
Stan Wygladala
13th March 2023 10:56 pm
Good to hear from you.
Another “mental “ technique was that if one fell off an arête you needed to jump off the other side to perform as arrest. Please let me know one person who perform this. And lived to tell the tale.
And, please listen to White Room by Cream as I think it may have been a subliminal action on your part.