Avalanche Forecast

Moderate

Explosive control has consistently produced small to large (size 1.5 to 2.5) slab avalanches across the region over the past week. These avalanches all occurred above 2200 m and have failed on both surface hoar and facet layers.

There were reports few size of a size 1-2 wind slab avalanches on Thursday.

A dusting of new snow buried a recently formed surface hoar layer, sun crust, and wind-affected snow. A prominent rain crust is found 30 to 50 cm deep and has been reported to extend as high as 2300 m around Invermere and 2000 m around Golden. A layer of surface hoar is also found at this depth and is a particular concern in areas without a thick crust. The bottom of the snowpack contains large weak snow grains and in some places a hard crust near the ground. Typical snowpack depths at treeline are 60 to 110 cm, and taper rapidly below treeline.

Friday Night

Mostly cloudy with 1 to 3 cm of snow, alpine wind west 10-20 km/h, treeline temperature -9 °C.

Saturday

Mostly cloudy with 1-2 cm of snow, alpine wind west 20-40 km/h, treeline temperature -6 °C.

Mix of sun and cloud with no precipitation, alpine wind northwest 10 to 20 km/h, treeline temperature -5 °C.

Mix of sun and cloud with no precipitation, alpine wind southwest 10 km/h, treeline temperature -6 °C.

More details can be found in the Mountain Weather Forecast.

• Use conservative route selection and resist venturing out into complex terrain.
• Surface hoar distribution is highly variable. Avoid generalizing your observations.
• Watch for newly formed and reactive wind slabs as you transition into wind affected terrain.
• Avoid thin areas like rock outcroppings where you're most likely to trigger avalanches failing on deep weak layers.