The upper layers of the snowpack differ greatly from one mountain and feature to another, leading to isolated problems.
Don't let familiarity lower your guard, and keep assessing for signs of instability.
Significant new wind slabs can be found on leeward slopes and in cross loaded locations of the alpine and treeline. Depending on the location, they rest either on the January 18th crust, or on a layer of lower density snow, which showed good propagation potential in our tests.
With the cold temperatures, facetted grains developed on and under the January 18 ice crust. We have been getting regular test results showing avalanche triggering potential for the past few days. As with any persistent slab problem, the problem is very sporadic, almost isolated and the spatial variability is significant. It is therefore possible to test a few meters away and get a completely different results on this crust. The probabilities of triggering are low, but the consequences could be very unfortunate. The problem seems to be a little more important at the treeline, where the snowpack is thinner, near natural obstacles, such as trees or rocks.
Evidence of a wind slab avalanche that occurred in the past 48 hours was observed on the Albert.
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The extreme winds have left a great deal of surfaces. In the alpine, at treeline and on exposed terrain below treeline, some areas are back to the January 18th crust, while on the lees, more than a 100 cm of wind pressed snow covers it. The crust continues to deteriorate at and below treeline, and this band of elevation keeps offering the best skiing, where 30 to 40 cm of lower density snow overlies the decomposing crust. In general, the height of the snowpack goes from 70 to 90 cm in the valley to 100 to 150 cm at mid-mountain.
Forecast for the Chic-Chocs ridges and summits.
Synopsis: A ridge of high pressure is building over the Chic-Chocs. A cold front will move on Tuesday with chilly winds. Watch for an inversion late Tuesday afternoon, as temperatures will approach zero at higher elevations.
Monday evening and night: Mostly clear. Trace of snow. Winds around 35 km/h, gusting up to 55 km/h from the northwest. Min. -16C. Freezing level at valley bottom.
Tuesday: Sunny, no precipitations. Winds from 60 to 70 km/h from the southwest. Max. -10C in the valley and -2C at higher elevations.
Wednesday: Cloudy. 3 to 5 cm of snow. Winds from 50 km/h, gusting to 80 km/h from the west. Max. -7C
Thursday: Mostly clear with no precipitations. Wind northwest 80 km/h to 50 km/h. Max. -15C.
For more details, check the Alpine Weather Forecast.
