Avalanche Forecast

A weather system passing into Oregon Friday night should not produce any appreciable new snow for the Olympics through Saturday morning.  Light snow showers are possible during the day. Temperatures are expected to remain cold with generally light winds.  

Watch for lingering wind slab mainly on non-solar aspects.  Small loose avalanches on steeper slopes are also possible. 

Manage the terrain by avoiding wind loaded lee slopes near and above tree-line. Watch for shooting cracks as a sign of instability. Even a small wind slab in the wrong terrain, i.e. above cliffs or very steep slopes, could have unintended consequences. 

A storm arrived at the end of January with rising snow levels and rain above 6000 feet for the Olympics before transitioning to snow and colder temperatures. Wind was less of a factor with this event with a more even distribution of storm snow and a general lack of wind slab during the storm cycle. Only about 1-3 inches of additional snow has accumulated in early February. 

Very cold temperatures this week have produced strong temperature gradients in the upper portion of the snowpack. The strong temperature gradient has lead to near surface faceting and a breakdown on recently buried crusts.  Moderate east to southeast winds in the Cascades built new wind slab during the week.  While winds were lighter over the Olympics, low density surface snow was available for transport and may have built shallow new wind slab that is poorly bonded on lee non-solar aspects. No new information has been received about the spatial character of the wind slab or how reactive it might be to human triggering as of 6 pm Friday. 

Regionally the avalanche danger is lower near Hurricane Ridge than in the Washington Cascades where a more diverse snowpack exists. See the Cascades forecast if traveling there.

The mid and lower snowpack west of the crest consists mainly of crusts and melt form crystal layers which have generally not been reactive to to snow pit tests. Low snow amounts are limiting the avalanche danger on many south slopes and at low elevations due to terrain and vegetation anchors.