Západné Tatry

Watch out for wet, slab avalanches.

Watch out for wet, slab avalanches.

In the Western and High Tatras there is a moderate avalanche danger (2nd degree) above the forest zone. In the last three days 10 to 20 cm, in some places 30 cm of new snow has been added. The snow has been beaten by the wind into slabs and pillows of different hardness, which are deposited on a hard base, while the two layers are weakly interconnected. After a cold spell, the weather warms up and positive temperatures occur even at the highest altitudes, causing the snow to become wet. The cohesion of the individual layers will deteriorate and spontaneous avalanches of wet snow may occur. Due to the overall low snow cover, these may be mostly only small or medium avalanches. The second avalanche problem is the permanently weak layer. Shady orientations and northern slopes are therefore particularly dangerous.

Between 10 and 30 cm of powder snow has been added in recent days. The snow is very unevenly distributed due to strong winds. The ridges are blown onto hard ground. There are a few ice crusts in the snow cover, with square-grained snow underneath. The crusts are not load-bearing, so they break through when moving on foot. Movement off the beaten track is difficult. Warming will cause the snow to set and become soggy. This will undermine its stability. On average, there is between 20 and 50 cm of snow in our mountains. The continuous snow cover is mostly above the forest belt.

With warming slightly rising.