Avalanche Forecast

On Thursday, mild temperatures will be accompanied by increasing morning clouds and a chance of very light rain on Thursday afternoon. 

Lingering shallow wind slabs should continue to become far less sensitive to triggering on Thursday and confined to higher terrain. Continue to watch for areas of recently wind transported snow such as fresh cornices, snow drifts, and uneven snow surfaces. Identify and avoid locations where recent wind loading occurred.

Wind slabs can be deceptively difficult to manage in the terrain. Take a moment and read our recent blog post by NWAC Pro Observer Jeremy Allyn on wind slabs.

In some areas, firm surface crusts will make for difficult travel conditions so be prepared to self-arrest and think about the sliding hazard before crossing steep slopes.  

Early season hazards still exist. Many creek beds have still not filled in for the winter.

Mild weather seen Sunday through Wednesday has allowed lingering wind slabs to gain strength.

On 12/29, snow levels rose to crest level by afternoon before dropping snow levels and SW winds Friday night redistributed post-frontal new snow, forming shallow wind slabs on lee slopes at higher elevations above a crust. This resulted in a variety of snow surfaces including soft unconsolidated snow, wind scoured slopes, rain crust, and firm wind slabs. 

The 12/16 mid-December crust can still be found 2-3 feet down within the snowpack.

Observations

NWAC pro observer, Matt Schonwald visited Hurricane Ridge on Friday, 12/29 and stressed that this is a different snowpack than the Cascades! He visited W-NW-N-NE aspects and found the 12/16 crust and 1-2 mm facets down 2.5 feet. Several PST tests failures, self-arrested, but propagated through most of the column along the 12/16 layer. This PWL will mostly likely be found below ridgelines and will have to be watched moving forward.