North Rockies

Avalanche hazard increases as you travel to higher elevations.

Watch for reactive slabs on all aspects, changing winds may load unexpected features.

Check out our forecaster blog here for the big picture.

Saturday Night: Partly Cloudy. Trace of new snow. Temperature dropping to -15 at 1500 m. Moderate southwest winds, switching to northwest by the afternoon.

Sunday: Scattered cloud, clearing in the afternoon. No new snow expected. Temperature at 1500 m -16. Moderate to strong northwest winds.

Monday: Clear morning, cloud increasing over the day. No new snow expected. Temperatures above -15 at 1500 m, with a possible temperature inversion starting to set up. 

Tuesday: Overcast. 3-7 cm of snow expected. Strong to Extreme SW winds. Temperatures above -10 at 1500 m, with a possible temperature inversion.

No new avalanches observed.

Recently, a few large avalanches were observed in the Southeast corner of the region. These avalanches ran on a deep persistent layer, likely one of the crusts from late October or early November.

Wind slabs will be found in wind exposed terrain in the treeline and alpine. A crust exists below 1700m. The mid November rain crust can be found down 1m.

The lower snowpack consists of a series of early season crusts. These appear to be strong, but shallow alpine slopes along the eastern side of the Rockies towards Jasper may have weaker, faceted snow near the ground. Avoid thick to thin areas where you are more likely to be able to trigger this deeper instability. 

Snowpack depths are anticipated to be approaching 3 m in the alpine and around 150cm at treeline. Pine Pass area is currently the leader for snowpack depths.

• Watch for newly formed and reactive wind slabs as you transition into wind affected terrain.
• Wind slabs may be poorly bonded to the underlying crust.