Avalanche Forecast
Issued: Mar 17th, 2018 4:00PM
The alpine rating is , the treeline rating is , and the below treeline rating is Known problems include Storm Slabs.
stephen holeczi,
Parks Canada
Ski quality has improved, just watch for localized storm slab formation and how that is bonding to the surface below. It should stay cloudy Sunday but local danger could increase if the sun pops out.
Summary
Weather Forecast
5cm and mainly cloudy on Sunday with a slight cooling trend and light NE winds. The sun will return on Monday with a more diurnal pattern.
Snowpack Summary
20-30 cm of recent snow has formed a variable soft slab on some features that is slowly bonding to the underlying surfaces, such as melt freeze crust on solar aspects and older snow layers including facets on shady aspects. Below this the majority of the snowpack is stable and has recently shown no results in tests.
Avalanche Summary
Forecasters had a big whumpf in the surprise pass area today. It was on a northerly aspect at 2400m adjacent to the usual ski run and was found to be a 30cm soft slab over facets. Other storm slabs to size 2 have been seen over the last 24 hours including 1 below the ice climb "the tease" and on Cathedral Mountain.
Confidence
Timing or intensity of solar radiation is uncertain on Monday
Problems
Storm Slabs
20-30cm recent snow has formed a soft slab and has seen recent human triggering. Dig down to look at how the new snow is bonding to the surface below, as there are a variety of crusts, facets, and old snow depending on aspect and elevation.
The storm slab may be more sensitive to human triggering on solar aspects where it sits on sun crust
Aspects: All aspects.
Elevations: Alpine, Treeline.
Likelihood
Expected Size
Valid until: Mar 18th, 2018 4:00PM
