Avalanche Forecast
Regions: Bow Valley, Highwood Pass, Kananaskis, North 40, Spray - KLakes.
Rain has soaked the upper snowpack to about 2300m. Expect poor skiing and travel until things cool off. Natural avalanche activity will increase with the rising freezing levels.
Confidence
Moderate
Avalanche Summary
Several whumpfs observed today when breaking new trail in valley bottoms. Shooting cracks were visible in the upper 30cm of snow that has been saturated by the recent rain.
Party reported a small avalanche in the Hero's knob drainage around 11am.
Snowpack Summary
Field teams went for a short lived walk today in the commonwealth drainage. All efforts were given up on the way to Commonwealth lake due to a fully saturated snowpack and bad travel. 2000m and below the snowpack was moist to ground. With next to no freeze overnight and warm temps, expect travel to be terrible until the weather cools and the snowpack has a chance to freeze again.
Weather Summary
Monday will see partially sunny skies and no precip. West winds in the 50km/h range continue and freezing levels to hover around 2300m once again.
More details can be found in the Mountain Weather Forecast.
Terrain and Travel Advice
- Back off if you encounter whumpfing, hollow sounds, or shooting cracks.
- Be carefull around freshly wind loaded features.
- In areas where deep persistent slabs may exist, avoid shallow or variable depth snowpacks and unsupported terrain features.
- Watch for unstable snow on specific terrain features, especially when the snow is moist or wet.
Avalanche Problems
Loose Wet
Surface snow becoming moist and wet with rain and high freezing levels.
Aspects: All aspects.
Elevations: Treeline, Below Treeline.
Likelihood: Possible - Likely
Expected Size: 1 - 2
Persistent Slabs
Hard and soft slabs have developed from the warm temperatures, wind and small snowfall amounts. These sit on top of cold snap facet interface. Sun crusts are also found on steep solar aspects around treeline
Aspects: All aspects.
Elevations: Alpine, Treeline.
Likelihood: Possible - Likely
Expected Size: 1 - 2
Deep Persistent Slabs
This layer is getting getting buried deeper and deeper over time. The weight and amount of new snow is slowly increasing, which will increase the size of any potential avalanches.
Aspects: North, North East, East, South East, South.
Elevations: Alpine.
Likelihood: Possible
Expected Size: 1.5 - 3