Totes Gebirge South

Significant avalanche danger in all aspects! Even a single person can trigger a slab avalanche!

Significant avalanche danger in all aspects! Even a single person can trigger a slab avalanche!

The avalanche danger is considerable above the tree line (level 3), below it is low. In particular, older snowdrift accumulations, but also bonded snow in all aspects due to warming, can be triggered as medium slab avalanches in many places, especially behind ridgelines, terrain edges and in gullies and bowls, even under slight additional load.

Up to 60 cm of new fallen snow has fallen since Thursday. The snow has been transported to the eastern sectors by stormy westerly to north-westerly winds over a large area, but locally all directions and also forest aisles below the tree line may be affected. As a result of the warming, a bound snow layer will also develop in places where there was previously unbound powder. Weak layers are mainly found between drift and new fallen snow and the old snowpack (unstable layer of faceted crystals). In the foundation of the snow cover, kinetic metamorphism (floating snow) weakens the stability.

In the first half of the night, the snowfall level rises from 1200 m to 1500 m, while it is still snowing or raining at low altitudes. However, the snowfall will subside everywhere around midnight. As a result, the clouds will become softer, with only thin, high veil clouds passing by. And so it is very sunny and dry for most of the day. The temperature at an altitude of 2000 metres will be a mild 0 to +2 degrees. A brisk wind from the west.

Wednesday will be mild and mostly sunny. Although the warming may lead to some spontaneous avalanches, the avalanche danger is slowly decreasing.