The new snow has brought a welcome re-set and some great skiing. However, the new snow is not bonding well to the old surfaces. Human triggering is very likely in any wind affected terrain. Conservative terrain choices are in order.
Up to 30cm of recent snow sits on a hard slab in many areas, and the bond doesn't seem that good. Some cracking was observed Monday at 2400m in steeper terrain, and it is expected that this condition is worse at upper elevations.
Tuesday will be mainly cloudy with another 5cm expected. Temperatures will show an abnormal trend, starting out at -15c and dropping through the day into the -20's. Winds should be relatively light from the west.
Wednesday looks cold with temps between -20 and -30.
Several naturally triggered loose dry avalanches were observed in Alpine terrain. These slides were up to size 2.0 and occurred on SE, N and NE aspects.
Up to 30cm of new snow fell at treeline over the past 24 hours, with an additional 3 to 5cm through the day. In general, this new snow is not bonding well with the underlying surface, especially in areas with this previous surface was hard wind slab or sun crust. Fresh surface wind slabs 30 to 60cm thick are evident in the Alpine and just into treeline, and the strong winds will continue to build these through the night. Forecasters observed cracking in steeper terrain at 2400m on Monday. Lee and cross-loaded terrain is a concern for human triggering. Several loose dry avalanches were also observed in steep terrain.
