Colder air has crept back into the region, locking us into a wintery feeling in the Alpine and crisp morning temps in the valley bottom.
Enjoy the fast travel conditions, but watch for windslabs and loose power sluffing at the top of your line.
New snow and moderate winds Saturday built fresh windslabs in lees. Winds have since shifted to NE'ly and will be reverse-loading Alpine slopes. The windslabs sit on crusts on sun-exposed slopes, while they overlie dry, settled snow on N aspects.
Cool temps with freezing levels at valley bottom, a mix of sun and cloud, and E'ly winds for a few days.
Tonight: Mainly clear, Alp low -17*C, light E wind.
Tue: Cloudy with sunny periods, Alp High -12*C, light E wind
Wed: Mix of sun/cloud, Alp low -18*C/high -11*C, light E wind
Thurs: Cloudy with isolated flurries, Alp high -10*C, light E wind
Up high, previous strong SW winds, now mod N'ly winds, redistributed 15cm of new snow into immediate lee features. These soft windslabs sit on a crust on all but N'ly alpine slopes, where settled dry snow is found. Below Treeline the spring snowpack currently has a solid supportive crust. The March 30th melt-freeze crust is buried 30-70cm deep.
No new avalanches have been observed in the highway corridor the last 48hrs, nor by a field team up towards Lookout Col and the Ravens.
Glide cracks continue to widen. Give them the utmost respect, as it is very difficult to forecast when they will fail. When they do finally fail, they have immense destructive power!
