Avalanche Forecast

Fair - Timing or intensity of solar radiation is uncertain

Synopsis: The weather pattern is generally stable with a weak northwesterly flow. Some convective flurries may happen in the afternoon.Wednesday: Sunny with a few cloudy periods. Freezing level s at valley bottom overnight, rising to 1500m in the afternoon, winds generally light occasionally gusting to moderate from the south west.Thursday: Cloudy with flurries, trace of precipitation. No overnight freeze, freezing levels rise to 1800m in the afternoon, winds generally light, occasionally gusting to moderate from the south west.Friday: Sunny with cloudy periods and some  flurries. No overnight freeze and freezing levels may go up to 2100m,  winds light to moderate from the south west.

A low probability, but high consequence avalanche problem plagues the Columbia regions. These highly destructive and largely unpredictable avalanches are expected to be isolated, but certainly possible anywhere at any time. Avalanches continue to step down to old, deep weak layers. Numerous size 1.5 and 2 avalanches were reported yesterday as well as a size 3 and a 3.5 avalanche!  The smaller avalanches were, for the most part, in the recent storm snow, but the big ones were on south and south west aspects and most likely the result of solar heating and  generally rising spring temperatures. Sluffing in steep terrain is being reported on all aspects.

Recent warm temperatures have resulted in good settlement and bonding of the storm snow from earlier in the week. Reports of human-triggered avalanches have diminished. Three persistent weaknesses contribute to a highly variable snow pack with the possibility of triggering deeper instabilities. The mid-March sun crust/surface hoar layer down 50-80cm still has potential for human-triggering in isolated areas. The early-March crust/facet/surface hoar layer down around 80-120cm has become less susceptible to triggering by light loads, but still has the ability to produce large avalanches, and we continue to see avalanches stepping down to this layer. The mid-February crust/facet/surface hoar layer is typically down at least 1.5m and direct triggering has become unlikely. However, large loads like cornices or smaller avalanches stepping down can still trigger this layer and produce very large avalanches.