Wednesday, March 4, 2009

p.e. no.09 - Ten Percent Water

To my fans, all two of you, I'm sorry I haven't posted in a while. I've been working on other stuff. But last Tuesday (2/24) we had a weird snowstorm roll in that I couldn't ignore with my camera.

Usually the water content of the snow up here is around 5%, much lighter than the average 10% at lower elevations. This storm was the exception. I measured 12% after almost two feet total snowfall over two days. I had to shovel the outhouse path half a dozen times on Monday to keep ahead of it. The temperature hovered just above freezing both days.

I woke up early Tuesday. The snow had stopped falling so I went out to do another quick shovel. The weather was foggy and strange, with zero wind. I've been waiting for a good picture day like this. I snowshoed up Copper Creek road and could hear aspens snapping under the weight all around me as I went. I'm glad I got an early start too, because owing to the sun's heat and the slightest breeze the snow was all gone on the trees by noon.


























That's Dennis walking across the previous two pictures.














I'll post more pictures of this storm soon...

2 comments:

Dan Jones said...

Way to go!

Great pictures and I am glad yo see you post again.

best wishes
-dan

Unknown said...

John - those pix are fantastic! Really incredible! Thanks for posting!