Avalanche Forecast

Fair - Forecast snowfall amounts are uncertain

Overnight and Sunday: Another 10 to 20 cm precipitation in the forecast. Winds remain strong from the S-SW, freezing levels should near or at valley bottoms.Monday: Light precipitation, 5-10 cms, winds changing to W-NW, freezing levels may rise to 1200m.Tuesday: Light flurries, moderate to strong winds from the west, freezing levels may rise to 1400m in parts of the forecast area

There have been reports of easily triggered soft slabs and large surface sluffs in moderately steep terrain, and,.. the slab avalanches were propagating quite far. A natural avalanche cycle has been reported by commercial operators throughout the forecast area with avalanches up to size 3. Buried persistent weaknesses may now become reactive with heavy loading from snow and wind. Large destructive avalanches running full path are possible.

Up to 50 cm of recent storm snow has fallen in the last few days bringing close to 70 cm of new snow sitting on a variety of older snow surfaces. ranging from stiff wind slabs to a soft layer of facetted snow and/or surface hoar. Below that at various depths ( 1 metre plus ) there's a thin melt freeze crust below 2100m and a couple of buried weak layers (surface hoar, facetted snow, and/or a crust) that continue to be reactive in snowpack tests.There are two deeper layers of note. A late-November persistent weak layer consists of a sun crust on steep south facing slopes and surface hoar in sheltered areas and is now buried 90-160cm below the surface. The October deep persistent weak layer consists of a layer of facets sitting on a crust at the base of the snowpack. This layer is predominantly found on northerly aspects at treeline and in the alpine. The depth of both these layers makes directly triggering an avalanche on them unlikely (maybe a heavy load on a thin spot in steep terrain). Their presence could, however, increase the size of a potential avalanche through step-down.