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Avalanche Forecast

Archived

Dec 7th, 2018–Dec 8th, 2018

Alpine
Natural avalanches unlikely, human triggered possible.
Treeline
Natural avalanches unlikely.
Below Treeline
Natural avalanches unlikely.
Alpine
Natural avalanches unlikely, human triggered possible.
Treeline
Natural avalanches unlikely.
Below Treeline
Natural avalanches unlikely.
Alpine
Natural avalanches unlikely, human triggered possible.
Treeline
Natural avalanches unlikely.
Below Treeline
Natural avalanches unlikely.

Regions

Lizard-Flathead.

Cold and dry conditions continue with no change in the foreseeable future.

Confidence

Moderate - Due to the number of field observations

Weather Forecast

FRIDAY NIGHT: Cloudy, moderate wind out of the west, alpine temperatures drop to -16 C.SATURDAY: Local valley cloud, alpine high temperatures around -10 C, light wind out of the west, light flurries possible overnight into Sunday.SUNDAY: Scattered cloud cover, alpine high temperatures around -6 C, moderate to strong wind out of the southwest.MONDAY: Cloudy, alpine high temperatures around -4 C, strong wind out of the west.

Avalanche Summary

Recent avalanche activity has been limited to a few small wind slabs and loose dry avalanches mostly in steep alpine terrain.The last notable avalanche reported was a size 2 human triggered avalanche on Sunday in Cornice Bowl north of Fernie. It occurred on a northwest facing feature at 2300 m and ran on a crust in the lower snowpack. There are good photos in this MIN report.If you're in the backcountry and have observations to share, please post to the Mountain Information Network (MIN).

Snowpack Summary

Early season conditions prevail in this region with roughly 100 cm of snow in alpine areas and much less at lower elevations. Surface conditions range from soft power, hard wind slab, and some sun crusts.The main concern is the snowpack is a combination of weak sugary snow and crusts in the bottom half of the snowpack. See the snow profile in our field team's MIN report here for a visual representation of the snowpack. The crust is most prevalent at and above treeline and is likely most problematic on north-facing features, especially those that are large and planar in nature.

Problems

Persistent Slabs

Persistent Slab avalanches are the release of a cohesive layer of snow (a slab) in the middle to upper snowpack, when the bond to an underlying persistent weak layer breaks. Persistent layers include: surface hoar, depth hoar, near-surface facets, or faceted snow. Persistent weak layers can continue to produce avalanches for days, weeks or even months, making them especially dangerous and tricky. As additional snow and wind events build a thicker slab on top of the persistent weak layer, this avalanche problem may develop into a Deep Persistent Slab.