Kananaskis

The treeline avalanche hazard has risen. The variability and complexity within the upper snowpack makes terrain usage and snowpack observations critical. Be curious while you are traveling, don't hesitate to dig and inspect the snowpack.

Good

Continued NW flow with valley bottom winds light, out of the west. Temperatures will be similar to today, -15 in the morning, rising to -8 in the afternoon.

A localized natural cycle was noted on Hero's knob itself. East to South aspects had a number of slabs release. All activity was thought to be sliding on the crust. Sz 2 was the average size.

The Hero's knob area was explored today. Below treeline, the snow pack was generally predictable and in tune with what we've been seeing for the last while: a distinct crust buried with 10cm's of new snow and a solid midpack. Treeline, was a different story all together. The snowpack was a mix of different crusts, windslabs, facets and depth hoar. The general feel was that the snowpack was variable in terms of strength and we had a hard time trusting it. The Dec13th crust was down 30cm's, and reactive(see avalanche observations). Compression tests ranged from easy to moderate with sudden plainer failures. The deeper layers were still reacting the tests, but not until the "hard" range. Snow depths at 2200m were 90-110cm's.