Glide Cracks
- Alpine
- Treeline
- Below treeline
- Likelihood
- Possible
- Size
- 2–3
Glide avalanches are large and unpredictable. Luckily, if we pay close attention to the terrain where we are traveling we can have a really good idea of where the hazard exists. Avoid traveling below slopes where there is an open glide crack. This may look like a gaping brown crack on the slope, or it may be more subtle, like an entire slope with a wrinkled surface.
We are in a bit of a holding pattern with the cold, clear, and calm weather we've seen for the past few days and not much is expected to change avalanche-wise. We are still concerned with the amount of glide activity we've seen throughout our advisory area, especially in the Turnagain Pass zone. This includes cracks slowly opening up as the entire snowpack creeps down the hill, as well as dozens of these cracks releasing into large avalanches failing at the ground. Although it is easy to associate this avalanche problem with warm weather, we often see some of our most active glide cycles during cold snaps like the one we are currently experiencing.
In addition to the glide avalanche problem, there is still an outlying chance you may find unstable snow in isolated pockets of steep, wind-loaded terrain. Keep this in mind even though the snowpack is generally stable right now. It is always important to travel one at a time, watching your partners from safe spots outside of runout zones, and have an escape route planned if you do happen to trigger an outlier avalanche.
(11/24/2024)
Open glide cracks on the south-facing terrain in Main Bowl.