Avalanche hazard exists in areas with a surviving snowpack, like high alpine bowls, gullies and ridgelines. Warming on Sunday will destabilize recent snow sitting over a slippery crust.
Deep deposits of wind-loaded snow sit over a slippery crust in lee features in wind-exposed terrain. In the short term, warm temperatures will have a destabilizing effect on the cold snow, but in the longer term they will promote bonding.
As warm temperatures melt the surface snow, loose wet avalanches become more likely in steep terrain. Exposed rocks heat up with daytime warming and become likely trigger points.
10 to 30 cm of recent snow is settling rapidly in the warm temperatures. It sits over a thick crust or directly on the ground in areas where the snowpack was washed away by last week's rain. In exposed terrain, the recent snow has been redistributed into lee features by strong west winds.
In the high alpine, greatest snowpack depths are in the range of 1 m. Elsewhere, most areas are below threshold for avalanches.
No new avalanches have been reported.
First a mini warm up on Sunday, then a major warm up on Tuesday night.
Saturday night
Increasing cloud. West wind 30-50 km/h switching southwest and easing overnight. Alpine temperature rising to 0 °C. Freezing level rising to 300 m.
Sunday
Mostly cloudy with up to 5mm of mixed precipitation concentrated south of Port au Port. West wind 20-40 km/h. Daytime freezing level 400 m dropping to sea level overnight. Alpine daytime high +2 °C, overnight low -14 °C.
Monday
Sunny. Northwest to northeast wind <20 km/h. Alpine daytime high -5 °C, overnight low -15 °C.
Tuesday
A mix of sun and cloud. Southwest wind 20-30 km/h. Alpine temperature -1 °C. Freezing level 200 m, then rising to 3000 m overnight and into Wednesday.
More details can be found in the Mountain Weather Forecast.
