Goldberg Group Central

Superficial avalanches in extremely steep terrain, small snowdrifts

Superficial avalanches in extremely steep terrain, small snowdrifts

Avalanche dange is LOW. Due to diffuse radiation and daytime warming, loose-snow avalanches in isolated slab avalanches and glide-snow avalanches (mostly small, seldom medium-sized) can trigger. Older snowdrifts are evident mostly near ridges: mostly shallow, triggerable on N/E facing slopes. Above 2400 m on shady slopes there are isolated avalanche prone locations, triggerable by large additional loading (a fall, stomping, etc.) as a slab, which could then grow to large size.

The snowpack has - at most - a breakable melt-freeze crust which rapidly softens during the day. On north-facing slopes and in high alpine regions is there still loosely packed snow, elsewhere the snowpack is encrusted in early morning, softening during the daytime. The old snowpack is largely compact, in places a weak layer has formed around the Sahara-dust encrusted layer, but is hardly triggered, except by large additional loading (e.g. an avalanche).

On Friday night, skies will be heavily overcast. On Saturday in the Lungau, cloudy skies from the start. Further north, visibility is better, southerly foehn wind will create sunny phases before cloud cover moves in again. In the Tauern region, foehn will intensify (40-60-km/hr in afternoon), elsewhere it will not disturb. Hardly any precipitation. At 2000m: 1-5 degrees; at 3000 m: -3 degrees. On Saturday night, storm-strength southerly foehn, gusts well over 100 km/hr plus heavy clouds. On Sunday, sunshine and clouds will take turns. Foehn will be blowing in early hours at 80-100 km/hr, then gradually slacken off. At 2000 m: 0-3 degrees; at 3000 m: -7 degrees.

In high alpine regions on Sunday, fresh snowdrift accumulations generated by southerly foehn winds deposited on north-facing slopes and in gullies may be prone to triggering. Apart from high alpine regions, the wet-snow problem will persist.