Avalanche Forecast

Moderate - Forecast snowfall amounts are uncertain on Thursday

Overnight: 3-5 cm of new snow with moderate southeast winds and freezing down to 1000 metres. Thursday: 10-15 cm of new snow with a chance of convective flurries providing enhanced snowfall amounts in some areas. Expect moderate southeast winds becoming southwest in the afternoon. Daytime freezing up to 1700 metres. Friday: Another 3-5 cm of new snow with light southwest winds and daytime freezing up to 1500 metres. Saturday: A few more cm of snow with a chance of sunny breaks in the afternoon. Light winds with daytime freezing up to 1400 metres.

One deep persistent slab avalanche size 3.0 was reported on Tuesday from the Selkirks, there was no information regarding aspect or elevation. Natural cornice falls were reported up to size 3.0 on Monday. There were also reports of isolated wind slabs up to size 1.0. Loose dry and loose wet avalanches to size 1.0 were reported on Sunday.

The recent storm snow is 30-50 cm including the snow that fell late lat week. The recent snow sits above a mix of old surfaces that include melt-freeze crusts at treeline and below and on solar aspects in the alpine. Fragile new cornice growth also occurred along ridgelines over the course of the week. Below the new snow interface, a number of storm snow and crust layers that formed over mid to late March appear to be well bonded. The February weak layers are now down about 170-220 cm and the deep mid-December facet layer and November rain crust both still linger near the bottom of the snowpack. These deep weak layers produced large avalanches with cornice falls and other heavy triggers in late March and early April. Yet another deep release was reported in the region on Saturday. This activity, although growing more sporadic, is keeping these layers an ongoing concern. They may be more likely to fail on southerly aspects during periods of strong solar radiation.