Avalanche forecast

Glacier

Mar 16 – 17, 2022
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Archived · expired 5 years ago

Avalanche danger

Fri
Sat
Alpine
3 · Considerable
Treeline
3 · Considerable
Below
2 · Moderate
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Highlights

Storm slabs have been sensitive to human and natural triggering the last few days. Ongoing snow and wind will keep building on this problem, making it slow to settle and stabilize.

Avalanche problems

  • Loose Dry

    • Alpine
    • Treeline
    • Below treeline
    Likelihood
    Possible - Likely
    Size
    1–2

    In steep sheltered terrain, human-triggered sluffs are running within the storm snow, gathering mass as they accelerate down slope.

  • Storm Slabs

    • Alpine
    • Treeline
    • Below treeline
    Likelihood
    Possible - Likely
    Size
    1–3

    Mild temps, steady flurries, and mod SW winds have formed storm slabs at all elevations.

    Be wary of convex rolls, ridge crests, and open cross-loaded slopes where these may be easier to trigger.

Weather Forecast

Cloudy, flurries, and freezing levels hovering around 1500m the next few days.

Tonight: Mainly cloudy, Alpine low -8*C, moderate SW ridgetop wind

Thurs: Flurries (7cm), high -5*C, freezing level (FZL) 1500m, moderate SW wind

Fri: Flurries (6cm), low -7*C, high -5*C, FZL 1500m, mod SW wind

Sat: Cloudy, low -6*C, high -3*C, FZL 1600m

Snowpack Summary

Storm snow continues to pile up (40-60cm of settled snow since Mar 11th), with moderate SW wind loading up lee aspects. Solar aspects now have several suncrusts buried in the upper snowpack. On shaded aspects there are several layers of small surface hoar in the upper and mid snowpack; March 7 (down ~70cm); Feb 26 (down 90cm); and Feb 15 (down >1m)

Avalanche Summary

On Thursday.

Several size 2-3 natural storm slabs occurred above the highway, and we had reports of naturals up to size 3 in the Illecillewaet valley.

A field team triggered a few size 1.0 storm slabs, failing on the Mar 11th suncrust on steep supported rolls below treeline.

Avalanche control produced size 2-3 avalanches in recently controlled terrain

Confidence

Forecast snowfall amounts are uncertain

Regions covered