Some of you must have been naughty, as we've gotten facets instead of stellars so far... Happy Holidays and lets hope for snow in the New Year!
Summary
Weather Forecast
A surface high just off the coast is keeping any major systems away. Generally, we will see alpine temps in the -5 to -10 range, with some light snow on Thursday and Friday. Alpine winds will be moderate to strong from the W/SW. Valley winds will be light.
Snowpack Summary
5-10cm of new snow in the W tapers to nothing in the E. A variety of surface weaknesses including widespread windslabs in the ALP and surface hoar at TL and BTL sit on a generally weak snowpack. The real concern is the facet/depth hoar/crust combo at the base of the snowpack which been triggered by light loads recently and can't be trusted.
Avalanche Summary
A size 2.5 was observed yesterday on a N aspect of Mt. Fairview. It was initiated as a wind-induced spindrift avalanche which pulled out a slab that failed near the ground. This is indicative of the widespread basal weakness present in the snowpack.
Confidence
Due to the number of field observations