As inputs of wind and snow become less intense Monday, we expect natural avalanche activity to diminish.
Human triggering remains a real concern: we have seen an alarming number of near-miss, human-triggered avalanches over the last week.
Stick to small low-angled slopes.
Avoid overhead avalanche terrain.
Recent storm snow has been redistributed into lee areas by moderate to strong winds. Incoming snow with continued moderate to strong SW winds will contribute to this problem. Use caution in lee areas and watch for wind loading above you which could trigger natural avalanches.
40-80 cm of settled snow overlies weak facets above the Feb 3 interface which is a crust in most areas. Many natural, human, and explosive-triggered avalanches have occurred on this layer in the past week and human triggering of this persistent weak layer remains likely in many areas.
Some recent avalanches have stepped down to the weak facet and depth hoar layers near the base of the snowpack resulting in large avalanches. This seems to be most common in thin, steep, rocky terrain in the alpine. Continue to treat large alpine features with caution.
Friday: a skier accidental avalanche occurred in steep treeline terrain. Explosive control on Mt Hector resulted in avalanches up to size 3 failing on both persistent and deep persistent layers.
Saturday: Sunshine Village Control triggered two cornices that pulled sz 2 slabs on the Feb 3 PWL in the fans. Elsewhere: a few small wet loose avalanches were observed in steep solar terrain and a few wind-triggered cornice failure and slab avalanches were reported in the alpine.
New snow buries sun crusts found on steep solar aspects, and combined with elevated west winds, contributes to wind slabs as well as extensive wind effect in open alpine and treeline areas.
40-80 cm of settled snow overlies weak facets above the Feb 3 interface which is a crust up to 2500 m and higher on solar aspects.
The lower snowpack consists of several facet layers from January and December. Depth hoar and facets found at the base are weaker in shallow snowpack areas.
Moderate to strong westerly winds will continue through Sunday night bringing up to 10cm of snow of a convective nature as freezing levels return to valley bottom.
Monday, winds will back off to light to moderate as the intensity of the precipitation tapers as well. Freezing levels are to rise to 1600-1800m.
For more detailed weather information, click here.
