The chance continues for riders or skiers to trigger slab avalanches in steep terrain at all elevations. These slabs could release in wind loaded areas, involving snow from the recent storm cycle or they could fail on deeper weaknesses, involving faceted snow that formed during dry periods earlier in the season. Identify and avoid wind loaded features and evaluate the snowpack carefully to determine where old weaknesses still pose a threat.
Slabs formed by southwest winds during the most recent storm cycle continue to be a hazard on steep wind-loaded slopes at the mid and upper elevations. These slabs could be triggered by the presence of a single person, could be soft or hard and have depths of one to three feet.
Some potential remains for persistent slabs to fail on old faceted snow layers in steep terrain at all elevations. These slabs could possibly fail if a person hits a particularly weak spot on a slope or following the initiation of a wind slab. These large to very large slab avalanches could be 3 to 5 feet deep hard slabs at the mid and upper elevations or one to three foot soft slabs at the lower elevations.
Periods of light snow or flurries are likely until around midnight. After a brief respite light snowfall will return to the southern portion of our forecast area on Thursday afternoon. Temperatures will be in the single digits above and below zero overnight. Daytime highs will rise into the positive single digits and teens in the mountains and into the 20s in the valleys. Winds are forecast to be light and variable.Humans who venture onto steep avalanche prone slopes could triggered surface slabs one to three deep that were formed during the past storm cycle and persistent slabs with depths of three to five feet that lie upon weak layers that formed earlier in the season. These dangerous persistent slabs are most likely to be triggered in areas that have exhibited poor snow structure for several months. Although there may be slopes where large slides can still be triggered by the weight of a single person these slabs may be more likely to be triggered by snowmachines. The general avalanche hazard is expected to be moderate in the Teton and Greys River/Southwest Trails areas and considerable in the Togwotee Pass area.
