The chance of natural or human-triggered avalanche activity has greatly reduced since the weekend. Caution is still advised in wind-loaded terrain and below large cornices. Strong winds and cloud cover are expected to keep many snow surfaces frozen. The best riding will likely be found in wind-sheltered northerly facing slopes where you can expect normal caution avalanche conditions.
Snow available for transport into new wind slabs has mostly run out. While the current southwest winds are doing more wind erosion than actual wind loading. Old wind slabs are stubborn and will be difficult to human trigger. Caution is still recommended on wind-loaded terrain and below large cornices.
A wind slab triggered by a cornice fall. ~4/1.
Large, stubborn slabs several feet thick or more exist over faceted weak layers in the upper snowpack. Remote triggers and natural avalanches failing on these persistent weak layers have been gradually diminishing since widespread activity last week. The most recent persistent slabs have required larger triggers such as the mass of a smaller avalanche running through the terrain or a cornice falling. The greatest number of avalanches have occurred on easterly-facing slopes where faceted crusts exist. Similar structures exist on west-facing terrain. Recent warming on lower elevation and more southerly aspects has strengthened the upper snowpack with crusts, and triggering persistent slabs is less likely in that terrain. Weak layers on north-facing terrain are less developed and have been less active.
Early warning signs for this avalanche problem are rare and feedback is infrequent. You can reduce your chance of triggering this avalanche problem by avoiding recently wind-loaded terrain and unusually shallow terrain. Safer riding is where the snowpack is deep, wind-protected, and on slope angles less than 35 degrees, without steeper slopes above.
Very large persistent slab on the east face of Gothic Mountain. 3/31. This avalanche was likely triggered by a cornice falling onto the slope.
We had the full kitchen sink of avalanche problems over the weekend. From hot storm slabs and wet avalanches to very large persistent slabs and numerous cornice avalanches. CBAC forecasters have been out verifying avalanche conditions and those avalanches were documented in the observations tab.
On Monday, loose wet avalanche concerns have ended with the forecasted cloud cover and strong wind keeping snow surfaces cool. Snow available for transport by the wind has mostly run out, so start zones are no longer seeing much for wind-loading. We can't completely rule out the existence of a few stubborn wind slabs, or another random cornice falling today. Otherwise, we are just waiting for the incoming storm to create new avalanche problems for Tuesday.
