Natural persistent slab avalanche activity has tapered. However, a cautious approach is warranted as there is still potential for human-triggered persistent slabs.
Recent new snow has been redistributed into alpine and treeline lee terrain. Wind slabs may be more reactive where sitting on a recently buried layer of surface hoar.
Two buried weak layers of facets and/or surface hoar that were buried mid February and early March have been recently reactive.
Reports from the last few days show several persistent slab avalanches up to size 1.5 in the alpine and treeline elevation bands. These were natural and skier-triggered. All were suspected of running on a recently buried surface hoar layer 30 to 40 cm deep.
20-30 cm of recent new snow has been redistributed by primarily southerly winds. This new snow fell on a widespread layer of large surface hoar crystals, which may sit on a crust on solar aspects and at low elevations.
A layer of facets, surface hoar and/or a crust from mid-February are buried 50 to 100 cm deep. This layer produced large natural and human-triggered avalanches through the previous week.
The remainder of the snowpack is well consolidated with no concerns at this time.
Friday Night
Mostly cloudy. 20 to 40 km/h east ridgetop wind. Treeline temperature -8 °C.
Saturday
Cloudy with 5 cm of snow. 30 to 60 km/h east ridgetop wind. Treeline temperature -8 °C.
Sunday
Mostly cloudy with isolated flurries. 15 to 30 km/h south and southeast ridgetop wind. Treeline temperature -3 °C.
Monday
Mostly cloudy with flurries. 30 to 50 km/h southwest ridgetop wind. Treeline temperature -2 °C.
More details can be found in the Mountain Weather Forecast.
