N face of Chair changing conditions

[Dane]

For those that wonder just how good Chair is right now?

Extra Fat is 2010. The others are years previous. All of the same entrance gully pitch.

 

 

Extra Fat!

 

 

Fat

 

 

Skinny

 

 

 

Inbetween

 

[spiderman]

Did it the yesterday and it was super-duper fat and fun. But the real question on all our minds, is how all this new snow is going to affect the route????????? Will it just turn into a snow climb?

[Dane]

It isn't snow yet. As long as we are getting good freeze thaw like the last week and sun effect like yesterday the snice will continue to build from the tiny bit of snow we get every day up there. Rain events like we got last Friday will just add to the ice/snice until we start getting a serious melt or a big dump of snow and avi danger goes through the ceiling.

 

On a normal winter you get a boney start that continues up the corner and then 3 pitches of snow climbing with bad pro except for the trees. This year it is snice and water ice top to bottom which is really rare imo.

 

I posted this to another thread but may be better repeated here.

 

"Climbed the N face and FR again last week. And FR today while buddies were on the NF. Close to perfect conditions throughout the basin after a good freeze last night. And it snowed lightly all day. But it was even colder the night before. Sun on all the stuff yesterday wouldn't make it any better. Unless you started up the route at dawn and climbed fast.

 

The clear weather and sunshine is a sucker punch around here. In these temps you really want to be on the climbs on a snowy, cloudy and cold day like today. Wind will chill it off as well and make things even better if you can live with it. Helps to remember we are cllimbing pretty low @ between 4 and 6K feet.

 

FR was likely shit yesterday with the sun bake. Today if was very fun, in a unique way But decent sticks and good pro.

 

Same conditions as today last year made Pineapple Experss easy. Couple of days later in blue sky weather a much better climber than I took a 300+' foot lead fall....because of sun bake. As tempting as it was yesterday I stayed home and waited for the cloud cover to come back in."

 

Alpine and ice is all about conditions. Sometimes the best conditions around here are overcast, cold, windy and snowing lightly.

 

[wayne]

Dane= Ice Pimp

There should be a Dane Appreciation Thread!

[Dane]

Pimping? What ever it takes, as I think I'm hilarious and no one has more fun!

 

[video:youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ryLYjVUQV50

 

 

[Off_White]

Dane= Ice Pimp

There should be a Dane Appreciation Thread!

 

Dane's a goddamned gem, but this isn't Supertopo.

[Dane]

That is some funny shit, off we aint ST, TG!

 

[Alpinfox]

Wind will chill it off as well and make things even better if you can live with it.

 

Wind will have no effect on the temperature of things that are already ambient temperature such as snow, ice, water.

[Dane]

"Wind will have no effect"

 

You miss the point. The temperature of snow and ice raises quickly in the sun often times well beyond the surrounding ambient temperature. Sunny day and no wind and you can have slop. Sunny day and a good wind and you may have a nice sun crust, snice or just ice depending on actual ambient temperature and the original conditions/exposure.

 

Think of a 30 below, sunny day, no wind and climbing on Weeping Wall = sun rotten slop. Add a bit of wind down Sunwapta pass and it is solid screws and sticks.

 

Same reason sunny, windless days are bad for the top of Drury.

 

 

"The rate of heat loss by a surface depends on the wind speed above that surface: the faster the wind speed, the more readily the surface cools. For inanimate objects, the effect of wind chill is to reduce any warmer objects to the ambient temperature more quickly. It cannot, however, reduce the temperature of these objects below the ambient temperature, no matter how great the wind velocity. "

[pms]

this is one of the reasons Peter and I chose the N. Face over the NE Butt. for our selected climbs book a few years ago. Better conditions more often was our thinking. Still as Dane points out neither climb has much ice very often. I think I've had ice most of the way only twice out of about 10. Once with a very happy Fred Beckey. It sounds like conditions now are worth jumping on. My guess is the good conditions will hold up for a while this year.

[Skatan]

That video reminds me of Max Headroom. Looks of pictures I guess that I scored on conditions for my first time climbing Chair and Flow Reversal. Sometimes the gods have to smile on you. Dane you have been gettin after it.

[jmace]

If the air is warmer than the snow in calm wind conditions then it would melt, in windy conditions it would melt even faster by continualy supplying warm dry air to take away moisture.

 

When do you get the coldest nights..when its calm, we get fog and frost.

 

The only way high winds will keep the snow cooler in pure sun conditions is if the ambient air is not much higher than the snow, but the loss of vapour due to winds would be more dominate therefore snow/ice will still melt.

 

Therefore in warm conditions no amount of wind will reduce melting, but in near freezing temps in pure sun it will marginally help but then you have moisture transport and sublimation and therefore "melt" or loss of snow.

 

Cloudy days are best and I can do with out the wind any time.

[Dane]

If the air is warmer than the snow in calm wind conditions then it would melt, in windy conditions it would melt even faster by continualy supplying warm dry air to take away moisture.

 

Agreed.

 

I was not addressing warm air conditions. Strong solar radiation (bright sun) will effect ice/snow even in well below zero ambient air temps.

 

Wind will affect the rate of evaporation, but it will not change the ambient temperature itself.

 

Ice/snow that is evaporating directly off the surface into the air (cold temps) isn't nearly as unstable as ice that is melting and running water under the surface. (warm temps)

 

The only effect wind has on inanimate objects, such as ice falls, is to more quickly cool the object to the current ambiant air temperature. Objects will NOT cool below the actual ambient air temperature. For example, if the ambient temperature outside is -10 degrees Fahrenheit then your ice climb will not drop lower than -10 degrees F.

 

Solar radiation can easily drive temperatures much higher than the ambiant air temps. Wind can cool the inanimate object back to ambient air temp.