East Slopes North

Friday will bring a slight shift in the weather with light snow developing and continuing overnight. While avalanches are unlikely, it's worth giving cornices plenty of space and not lingering under them. Look for the avalanche danger to increase on Saturday. 

On Friday, a weak storm will bring cloudy skies and less than an inch of snow. Overnight temperatures should allow crusts to freeze on southerly aspects, while continuing to weaken surfaces on northerly aspects. By Saturday, there could be enough new snow to soften travel conditions and possibly create some new avalanche concerns.

For now, there are a few things to keep in mind: Cornices are very large and hang over many leeward sides of ridges. While avalanches are very difficult to trigger, it's worth staying off and out from under cornices. If one did fall, it would be a very large trigger for the older wind-drifted slabs on the slopes below. 

On Thursday, professionals dug many snow profiles to investigate the upper snowpack in Cataract Creek, Willow Creek, Cedar Creek, and Varden Creek. They reported widespread surface hoar, 3-5mm in size, as well as near-surface facets on many shaded, northerly slopes. Almost none of these profiles produced test results indicating potential for human-triggered avalanches.

At this point, the primary concern is a poor bond at the new/old snow interface, though we will need more snow for actual avalanches on it. There are a few crusts in the top 1.5-2 feet of the snowpack, and some could have weak snow adjacent to them. The February 7th crust is 6-8" below the surface and the January 28th crust is below that, at a total depth of 10-16." 

About 10-20" of snow accumulated in the first two weeks of February. The last slide was reported on the 9th, when a few small wind slab avalanches were triggered on the leeward sides of ridges above 7,000ft. These were shallow, size D1-1.5, and involving recent snow. One may have run on a deeper crust, possibly from January 28th.