Observed and simulated snow profile data

This data set includes information on all observed and simulated snow profiles that were used to train and validate the random forest model described in Mayer et al. (2022). The RF model was trained to assess snow instability from simulated snow stratigraphy. The data set contains observed snow profiles from the region of Davos (DAV subset, 512 profiles) and from all over Switzerland (SWISS subset, 230 profiles). For each observed snow profile, there is a corresponding simulated profile which was obtained using meteorological input data for the numerical snow cover model SNOWPACK. The information on the observed snow profile contains a Rutschblock test result including the depth of the failure interface. As part of the study described in Mayer et al. (2022), each observed snow profile was manually compared to its simulated counterpart and the simulated layer corresponding to the Rutschblock failure layer was identified.

The data are provided in the following form: one file each per observed and simulated snow profile (2x512 files DAV, 2x230 files SWISS), two files (1 file DAV, 1 file SWISS) containing the observed information on snow instability, the allocation between observed and simulated failure layer, and all features extracted from the simulated weak layers that were used to develop the RF model.

• WSL research program Climate Change Impacts on Alpine Mass Movements (CCAMM)

• Schweizer, Jürg; Mitterer, Christoph; Reuter, Benjamin; Techel, Frank (2021). Field observations of snow instabilities. EnviDat. doi:10.16904/envidat.222.

Mayer, S., van Herwijnen, A., Techel, F., and Schweizer, J.: A random forest model to assess snow instability from simulated snow stratigraphy, The Cryosphere, zz, xxx–yyy, https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-2022-34, 2022