Natural avalanche activity is possible with the persistent warm temperatures. Cornices are soft and weak. Avoid travel under, on or anywhere near cornices.
Summary
Confidence
Moderate -
Weather Forecast
The weather pattern begins to change Friday with increased cloud cover and falling freezing levels overnight. FRIDAY: Mix of sun and cloud. Freezing levels 3000 m with an alpine high of + 6 degrees. Ridgetop winds light from West.SATURDAY: Cloudy with light rain at lower elevations and light snow in the alpine. Freezing levels falling to 1700 m and alpine temperatures near -1. Ridgetop winds light from the southwest. SUNDAY: Cloudy with light rain at lower elevations and 5-10 cm of snow in the alpine. Freezing levels 1700 m and alpine temperatures near -1. Ridgetop winds light from the southwest.
Avalanche Summary
On Wednesday, natural loose wet avalanches continue on solar aspects up to size 2.5 through the region.Natural avalanche activity will likely taper off on the weekend when temperatures and freezing levels start to drop to seasonal norms.
Snowpack Summary
Currently, solar aspects are showing signs of melt by day and a freeze by night. Only the upper 10-20 cm is re-freezing into a solid crust which breaks down by noon. Most solar slopes at lower elevations are becoming
isothermal. You can still find dry, wintery snow on North facing slopes in the alpine and variable wind effect remains. The bigger questions are deeper in the snowpack. Two crusts exist in the upper snowpack and the bond of the overlying snow is most concerning. The first crust is down 20 to 30 cm and loose wet avalanches have slid on this interface. The deeper one down 60-95 cm has also produced easy shears in test profiles and is potentially just waiting for enough heat to penetrate, creating a cohesive slab that may avalanche, if it does?
swerner,
Avalanche Canada
