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When the ground has a thick layer of fresh, fluffy snow, sound waves are readily absorbed into the snow surface, dampening sound. However, time and weather conditions may change the snow surface. If the surface melts and refreezes, the snow becomes smooth and hard.
If the accumulated snow survives one melt season, it forms a denser, more compressed layer called firn. The snow and firn are further compressed by overlying snowfall, and the buried layers slowly grow together to form a thickened mass of ice.
Water on the surface, from melting snow and summer rains, cannot get through permafrost. The top layer (or active layer) of soil may thaw and let water through. But underneath it, the permafrost acts like a waterproof barrier. Then shallow ponds, lakes, and marshes commonly form in the summer.
As the old snow gets buried by more new snow, the older snow layers compact into firn, or névé, a granular mass of ice crystals. As the firn continues to be buried, compressed, and recrystallizes, the void spaces become smaller and the ice becomes less porous, eventually turning into glacier ice.
Snowpack Layers. Through the course of the winter, the snow pack builds up. It snows, then stops; the new layers settle and compact, the snow grains in each layer changing (metamorphism) with time. Then it snows again. Each layer preserves some characteristics that tell us about its deposition and post-deposition history.
A common scenario for developing a faceted crust: warm, wet surface snow is buried by cold snow and facets because of the strong temperature gradient. This process is called melt-layer recrystallization.
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When the snow gets buried by more snow, it compacts into granular firn (or névé) with less air and it begins to resemble ice more than snow. Continual burial, compression, and recrystallization make the firn denser and more ice-like.
