Enjoy the great skiing, but use caution when entering or exposing yourself to larger terrain, especially at higher elevations.
The avalanche hazard is slowly decreasing as the snowpack adjusts to the recent snowfall; however, recent explosive control still triggered large avalanches that ran to mid-runout in avalanche paths.
Fresh snow is still available for transport, and moderate to strong southerly winds have created fresh wind slabs in the alpine and in open terrain at treeline. Mod-strong SW winds are forecast to continue into Monday and will add to the slab formation up high.
The natural avalanche cycle on the mid-November persistent layers down 80-140 cm has ended, however the snowpack needs time to adjust to the recent large load. While the likelihood of avalanches is decreasing, large avalanches are still possible on these layers in steep terrain.
No new natural avalanches were observed on Saturday, and explosive-triggered avalanches reported by the local ski areas were mostly small.
Previous highway avalanche control in Yoho and on the Sunshine Road Dec 18-19th produced results in the size 2.5-3 range.
On Dec 20th, the Lake Louise ski hill reported several explosive-triggered wind slabs up to 1.5, and Sunshine reported one size 3 persistent slab in previously uncontrolled terrain and one size 2.5 wind slab.
Another 5-20 cm of new snow on Sunday, with the most along the divide. Ongoing moderate to strong SW winds continue to create wind slabs in lee areas at alpine and treeline elevations. 35-60 cm of recent storm snow sits over the Dec 15 interface that includes a melt freeze crust below ~2000 m.
The mid Nov facet/crust layers are down 80-140 cm and were active this week with numerous large natural and explosive controlled avalanches.
Treeline snow depths are between100-180 cm.
Light flurries continue through Sunday night and Monday with total accumulations along the Divide of 5 to 10 cm. Moderate SW winds and treeline temperatures around -8°C forecasted for Monday.
Link to updated weather forecast tables from Environment Canada.
