Loose Wet
N
NE
E
SE
S
SW
W
NW
- Alpine
- Treeline
- Below treeline
- Likelihood
- Possible
- Size
- 3
Overnight, temperatures dropped below-freezing for the first time in 10 days, forming a strong surface crust but not completely stabilizing the warm, unconsolidated snowpack below. The crust will provide a window of safe and supportable travel early today, but once it deteriorates, it will be possible to trigger wet snow avalanches.
- Wet Loose - This will be the most common concern and the easiest to trigger. As the snow surface becomes soft and slushy, you can trigger wet loose avalanches that start in the surface snow and gouge down into the saturated snowpack. These avalanches start small and can quickly gain volume and speed as they entrain snow.
- Wet Slabs - As meltwater moves deeper into the snowpack, it can pool on buried crusts or weak layers, weakening the structure and allowing avalanches to break deeper and wider. These are larger and more destructive avalanches and may occur naturally, possibly failing down around crusts that formed over the holidays in late December. The best way to avoid this problem is to avoid travel on and beneath steep slopes during and after the heat of the day when meltwater is moving through the snowpack.
- Glide Avalanches - These avalanches occur when the entire snowpack slowly slides on the ground, typically over smooth rock slabs or grassy slopes. They are nearly impossible to predict and are almost always natural, such as the avalanche on High Ivory over the weekend. Avoid traveling on or beneath slopes with visible glide cracks or known glide activity, such as Broads Fork, Stairs Gulch, and Mill B South.