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Avalanche Forecast

Archived

Mar 1st, 2025–Mar 2nd, 2025

Alpine
Natural avalanches possible, human triggered probable.
Treeline
Natural avalanches unlikely, human triggered possible.
Below Treeline
Natural avalanches unlikely.
Alpine
Natural avalanches possible, human triggered probable.
Treeline
Natural avalanches unlikely, human triggered possible.
Below Treeline
Natural avalanches unlikely.
Alpine
Natural avalanches possible, human triggered probable.
Treeline
Natural avalanches unlikely, human triggered possible.
Below Treeline
Natural avalanches unlikely.

Regions

South Coast Inland, Birkenhead, Duffey, South Chilcotin, Stein, Taseko.

Remote triggers and wide propagations have surprised riders this week. Keep it conservative and resist venturing into consequential terrain.

Confidence

Moderate

Avalanche Summary

Large, scary persistent slab avalanche activity has been reported daily this week. Between Wednesday and Friday, naturals continued to be reported size 2-3 and remotely-triggered slabs (triggered by riders from hundreds of meters away) size 2-2.5. These slabs are failing on a layer of surface hoar buried 50 to 90 cm deep. They have been observed at alpine and treeline elevations.

Snowpack Summary

A widespread surface crust exists on most aspects and elevations.

50 to 60 cm of settled snow sits over a weak layer of facets, surface hoar and sun crust buried in mid February. Numerous large natural and remote-triggered avalanches have failed on this layer throughout the region this week.

Another weak facet/crust/surface hoar layer, from late January, is buried 40 to 80 cm deep. This layer has been the culprit for many very large natural, remote and human-triggered avalanches near Whistler in recent days.

Weather Summary

Saturday night

Partly cloudy. 10 to 20 km/h southwest ridgetop wind. Treeline temperature -2°C. Freezing level dropping to 1000 m.

Sunday

Mostly cloudy with a trace of snow. <10 km/h variable ridgetop wind. Treeline temperature -1°C. Freezing level 1800 m.

Monday

Sunny. 10 to 20 km/h north ridgetop wind. Treeline temperature -2°C. Freezing level 1600 m.

Monday

A mix of sun and cloud. 10 to 20 km/h southwest ridgetop wind. Treeline temperature -2°C. Freezing level 1600 m.

More details can be found in the Mountain Weather Forecast.

Terrain and Travel Advice

  • Be mindful that deep instabilities are still present and have produced recent large avalanches.
  • Keep in mind that human triggering may persist as natural avalanches taper off.
  • Avoid thin areas like rocky outcrops where you're most likely to trigger avalanches on deep weak layers.
  • Use careful route-finding and stick to moderate angled slopes with low consequences.

Problems

Persistent Slabs

Persistent Slab avalanches are the release of a cohesive layer of snow (a slab) in the middle to upper snowpack, when the bond to an underlying persistent weak layer breaks. Persistent layers include: surface hoar, depth hoar, near-surface facets, or faceted snow. Persistent weak layers can continue to produce avalanches for days, weeks or even months, making them especially dangerous and tricky. As additional snow and wind events build a thicker slab on top of the persistent weak layer, this avalanche problem may develop into a Deep Persistent Slab.