Avalanche Forecast

A weakening front should move over the Northwest Tuesday afternoon and night. This may cause some light amounts of snow at higher elevations along the east slopes but probably not as much as earlier expected.

The bigger story is the incoming atmospheric river on Wednesday. A warm front should south to north over the Olympics and Cascades Wednesday morning to afternoon. This should bring stormy wet weather with rising snow levels initially to Mt Hood Wednesday morning and to the Olympics and Washington Cascades Wednesday afternoon.

Little change may be seen by Wednesday morning along the Cascade east slopes. But by Wednesday afternoon watch for increasing alpine winds and increasing moderate rain or snow and rising snow levels.

Mainly in the above treeline new wind slab of increasing density due to warming is likely to form on lee slopes. Watch for firmer wind transported snow as the storm develops Wednesday afternoon.

Also mainly in the above treeline new storm slab of increasing density is also likely due to warming. Watch for snowfall that begins to accumulate Wednesday afternoon at more than an inch an hour.

The persistent slab avalanche problem will only be listed in the northeast zone and is most likely to be found on non-solar aspects in the above and near treeline band and stretching into the upper portion of the below treeline band.  This interface is likely getting harder for a human to trigger but if triggered is capable of producing large avalanches. Be aware that at depths approaching the 1 m mark the extended column test becomes a less reliable indicator of propagation across a column. Deeper tests like the propagation saw test or deep tap test may help but layer identification and terrain selection are your best friends for managing a persistent slab danger.

The rain where heavy enough mainly in the central east and southeast zones by Wednesday afternoon may activate previous layers and cause releases of previous wind slab layers or wet slab avalanches mainly in the near and below treeline. Rain in the same areas is also likely to create loose wet avalanche conditions. Watch for pinwheels and natural loose wet avalanches

Weather and Snowpack

During a period of fair weather in late February, widespread surface hoar formed in the northeast zone mainly surviving outside of steeper solar aspects and wind affected terrain.

A weak front buried the surface hoar layer in the Washington Pass area about 2/27 and to a lesser extent the central-east zone.  

The recent active weather pattern continued over the weekend with a system on Saturday night producing 0.50 to 1 inch of rain along the east slopes, except in the Washington Pass zone where rain likely stayed below 5500 feet and a few inches of snow accumulated above 6000 feet.

A front Sunday and a cooler upper trough Monday brought some snow with 2 day storm totals of up to about 6 inches along the east slopes ending Tuesday morning.

We are no longer tracking any layers of concern formed earlier this winter in the mid or lower snowpack due to lack of recent activity and confirming field observations. 

Recent Observations

An observation via our NWAC observation page came in March 2nd from the Pine Creek drainage in the Washington Pass area. A skier triggered and was caught and buried in a persistent slab avalanche on a N-NE aspect at 6600 feet releasing on buried surface hoar about 70 cm down. The full observation with photos can be found here. No one was injured.

Strong winds on Thursday March 3rd caused widespread natural wind slab avalanches in the NE zone. While many were contained to the recent storm snow, one larger slide on a N-NE aspect at Windy Pass likely released down to the February 27th PWL. 

Jeff Ward made observations near Wedge Mountain in the Central-East zone Friday, March 4th. Mild daytime temperatures and sunshine Friday allowed for the crust to soften on solar aspects, even providing spring corn conditions in some areas. Shaded terrain was still holding the recent colder powder. The interface from February 27th buried a little over 2 feet did not support propagation in a test pit at 6100 feet on NNE slope.

Observations from Mission Ridge pro-patrol Sunday indicated a firm upper snowpack after rainfall received Saturday night began to refreeze.