Olympics

After several weeks of warm and often sunny weather, winter returns to the Olympics. With this big change in the weather comes an increase in the possibility of avalanches. Slides will be most common in wind drifted areas and where the new snow bonds poorly to the underlying crust.

A winter storm began to impact the Olympics on Sunday with periods of light rain/snow and moderate to strong SW winds. However, less snow accumulated than anticipated. Don’t worry the storm will continue Sunday evening and snow levels should quickly fall. Locations near Hurricane Ridge could receive around 6-8 inches of snow by Monday afternoon. On the western side of the range, substantially higher totals may be found. Very strong winds during the storm will likely easily redistribute the new snow, blowing some windward aspects bare, and piling snow deeply on the opposite side of ridges. Anticipate any avalanche hazard to come from the new snow especially in wind drifted areas. 

From an avalanche hazard standpoint, we’re essentially starting from scratch. The snow surface prior to this storm was generally firm and rough. While the snow may struggle to bond to the firm snow, the roughness could help limit larger avalanches and hold the snow in place. Make observations as you travel. Do small slopes crack or fail? Do you see obvious signs that the wind deposited snow into firmer and deeper drifts? If so, avoid these types of slopes and features. In some locations prior to the storm, pockets of near-surface facets were observed. While these potentially weak grains were limited in the areas around Hurricane Ridge, they may be more widespread in other more remote parts of the range. If you triggered an avalanche on these persistent grains, it could fail very easily, break widely, or act in surprising ways. 

On Sunday a Level 2 course at Hurrican Ridge reported that the little bit of new snow bonded well to the moist old surface below treeline and into the lower end of the near treeline zone. This may change at higher elevations where the surface stayed frozen ahead of the precipitation. 

Other hazards formed during our prolonged “spring-like” January weather. Shallow snowpacks and even bare ground formed on many sun and wind-exposed ridges. Now, obstacles that were once buried have returned. Crevasse-like glide cracks opened on some steep slopes. All of these possible hazards may now hide under a thin covering of snow. Remember, the mountains changes a lot in the past few weeks, and even though it’s mid-winter, some “early season” hazards exist again.