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Avalanche Forecast

Archived

Dec 25th, 2018–Dec 26th, 2018

Alpine
Natural avalanches unlikely, human triggered possible.
Treeline
Natural avalanches unlikely, human triggered possible.
Below Treeline
Natural avalanches unlikely, human triggered possible.
Alpine
Natural avalanches unlikely, human triggered possible.
Treeline
Natural avalanches unlikely, human triggered possible.
Below Treeline
Natural avalanches unlikely.
Alpine
Natural avalanches unlikely, human triggered possible.
Treeline
Natural avalanches unlikely, human triggered possible.
Below Treeline
Natural avalanches unlikely.

Regions

Kootenay Boundary.

A weak layer lingers in our snowpack. It is a good time to remain conservative with your terrain selection. See this forecaster's blog, which describes this persistent problem: www.avalanche.ca/blogs/persistent-slab

Confidence

High -

Weather Forecast

TUESDAY NIGHT: Mostly cloudy, freezing level below valley bottom.WEDNESDAY: Cloudy with light snowfall, accumulation trace to 5 cm, light southwest winds, alpine temperature -10 C, freezing level below valley bottom.THURSDAY: Mix of sun and cloud, light northwest winds, alpine temperature -12 C, freezing level below valley bottom.FRIDAY: Increasing clouds over the day, light to moderate southwest winds, alpine temperature -12 C, freezing level below valley bottom.

Avalanche Summary

Small loose avalanches were observed on southerly aspects when the sun was shining. Otherwise, no new avalanches were observed on Monday.

Snowpack Summary

Recent sunny skies have produced a thin sun crust on southerly aspects. Dry, soft snow is found elsewhere.Beneath this, around 50 to 100 cm of snow is poorly bonded to a rain crust and a weak layer of feathery surface hoar and sugary facets. Although there has not been a reported avalanche on this layer for 5 days, snowpack test results tell us that it is still possible to trigger. It is best to remain conservative and travel cautiously with this layer in the snowpack.The lower snowpack is well-settled.

Problems

Persistent Slabs

Persistent Slab avalanches are the release of a cohesive layer of snow (a slab) in the middle to upper snowpack, when the bond to an underlying persistent weak layer breaks. Persistent layers include: surface hoar, depth hoar, near-surface facets, or faceted snow. Persistent weak layers can continue to produce avalanches for days, weeks or even months, making them especially dangerous and tricky. As additional snow and wind events build a thicker slab on top of the persistent weak layer, this avalanche problem may develop into a Deep Persistent Slab.