In reply to Clauso:
Here are my observations from yesterday:
Quick ascent of Raise from St John's in the Vale.
Snow line much, much lower on N to E facing aspects (thick banks down to below 600m still).
Freezing level approx 700m (lower than forecast), snow had a definite crust from that altitude upwards, becoming thicker (and the snow underneath firmer) as height was gained. People were ski-ing on the Raise ski area despite this mother of all breakable crusts!
There is a LOT of snow above 700m, any gully and hollow is full, only raised ground facing into the wind was stripped (or rather had a thin layer of very compacted, icy snow).
Summit of Raise was heavily verglassed.
Failed to dig a test pit as I intended due to the frozen snow.
All faces on Helvellyn visible from Raise, including Brown Cove Crags (before the cloud came in again) were almost entirely white - expect any gully in the North to East aspect to be holding a LOT of snow, probably with buried melt-freeze layers.
No sight of avalanche debris or signs of slumping or movement in the snowpack - the combination of wind and freeze thaw seems to have done a very good job of consolidation on these faces at least (which are no where near as sheltered as the Red Tarn face!)
Hope this is of some use for people.
PP.