Storm snow is settling and taking its time to bond to old layers.
Continue to choose conservative terrain, as the likelihood of triggering large avalanches remains high.
It remains possible that humans could trigger surface hoar and/or faceted grains that were buried mid-February, especially at high elevations where a thick crust doesn't exist above it.
Riders could trigger large avalanches where the 50 to 80 cm of recent snow is slow to bond to underlying layers of surface hoar and/or a hard crust. Slabs may also be touchy in immediate lee terrain features from new snow and strong wind.
On Friday near Mcbride, a few small to large (size 1-2) natural and human trigger avalanches where observed in both alpine and treeline elevation bands.
Two large (size 2) naturally triggered persistent slab avalanches were observed in the alpine near Valemount on Tuesday. These occurred on east aspects, were 100 cm deep, and failed on the buried weak layer noted in the snowpack summary.
60 to 90 cm of storm snow has accumulated over the past 7 days. All this snow sits on a hard melt-freeze crust found everywhere except north-facing slopes above 1600 m. There may also be isolated surface hoar crystals above the crust in wind-sheltered terrain around treeline. Southwest wind may have formed deeper and touchier deposits in lee terrain features at high elevations.
A weak layer of surface hoar and/or faceted grains buried mid-February is around 70 to 120 cm deep.
The lower snowpack is well-settled.
Friday Night
Mostly cloudy with 1 to 3 cm of snow. 10 to 20 km/h southwest ridgetop wind. Treeline temperature -12 °C.
Saturday
Mostly cloudy with 2 to 5 cm of snow. 20 to 50 km/h southwest ridgetop wind. Treeline temperature -6 °C.
Sunday
Mostly cloudy with 2 to 5 cm of snow. 20 to 30 km/h southwest ridgetop wind. Treeline temperature -5 °C.
Monday
Mostly cloudy with 2 to 5 cm of snow. 20 to 30 km/h southwest ridgetop wind. Treeline temperature -5 °C.
More details can be found in the Mountain Weather Forecast.
