Avalanche Forecast

Friday night: Clear, strong southwest winds, approaching extreme at ridgetop. Alpine low temperature around -6 C, freezing levels around 1200m.

Saturday: Flurries accumulating 5-10 cm. Strong west to southwest winds. Alpine temperatures around -6 C, freezing levels dropping to valley bottom.

Sunday: Mix of sun and cloud with isolated flurries. Moderate southwest winds. Alpine temperatures around -4 C, freezing levels rising to 1200 m.

Monday: Mix of sun and cloud with isolated flurries. Moderate southwest winds. Alpine temperatures around -4 C, freezing levels valley bottom.

Explosive control work produced windslab avalanches up to size 2 on Thursday. 

The chance of full depth avalanches has diminished since the very large deep persistent slab avalanche cycle around Christmas, but they could still occur under one of the following scenarios: we get unusually high accumulations of new snow or wind-blown snow; or from human-triggering in a thin, rocky start zone.

Recent snow and strong winds have formed fresh wind slabs up to 30 cm deep in the alpine and open areas at treeline. A reasonably consolidated upper snowpack overlies a weak base. The bottom 30-50 cm of the snowpack consists of weak facets and crusts. Although these layers are unreactive in snowpack tests and have not produced avalanche activity recently, there is the potential for them to wake up with large loads or significant warming.

• Watch for newly formed and reactive wind slabs as you transition into wind affected terrain.
• Seek out sheltered terrain where new snow hasn't been wind-affected.
• Avoid steep, rocky, and wind effected areas where triggering slabs is more likely.
• If triggered, wind slabs avalanches may step down to deeper layers resulting in larger avalanches.