Weather Forecast
Today should bring more flurries, light to moderate southerly winds and sunny periods this afternoon. Monday should be mostly clear and dry with light southerly winds. Another low pressure starts to move into the region on Tuesday bringing increasing cloud and scattered flurries.
Snowpack Summary
Very soft slabs exist on lee and crossloaded features at treeline and above. 10cm of new snow overnight sits on 35cm of settled storm snow over well settled snow. The Nov28 surface hoar is down about 80cm where it exists, and the early Nov crust is widespread and down about 1.5m. Tests on these layers indicate they would be hard to trigger.
Avalanche Summary
Yesterday, skiers triggered very soft slabs on steep north aspects. They were triggered from lee and crossloaded features; just below ridge crest on a gully. The avalanches were size 1-1.5, 20-30cm deep and propagated 30m wide. They ran about 100m. Also, 3 natural size 2 avalanches were observed from north aspects.
Problems
Wind Slabs
Wind Slab avalanches are the release of a cohesive layer of snow (a slab) formed by the wind. Wind typically transports snow from the upwind sides of terrain features and deposits snow on the downwind side. Wind slabs are often smooth and rounded and sometimes sound hollow, and can range from soft to hard. Wind slabs that form over a persistent weak layer (surface hoar, depth hoar, or near-surface facets) may be termed Persistent Slabs or may develop into Persistent Slabs.