February 23, 2014, Kendall Ridge/Commonwealth

We stayed in the trees generally at or below the treeline but did venture up to about 5223' beneath Kendall Peak on a W-SW 32-degree aspect, did a single column test in an open area, observed very stable results (got a fracture in a storm layer at 40cm after 8 arm drops but it didn't sheer off and I actually was unable to get it to move with my glove without pulling the whole column over, got nothing else after 20 arm drops) and then skied it while hugging the tree line. No issues except for several sluff slides that were in the top few inches of snow that had fallen today and maybe yesterday but no other whoomphing or shooting cracks.

We did another test pit earlier on Kendall Ridge at 4629' in the trees on a N-NW 28-degree aspect and triggered a storm layer at 30cm after 5 arm drops (not a clean fracture but did get it to separate from the rest of the column with a pull with the glove) and THEN got the January crust @ 90cm to go after the 8th arm drop. It was not a clean fracture at all and the snow was very chunky but dang that would be a nasty wall of snow to have coming down on you:
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