Avalanche forecast

Waterton Lakes

Apr 3 – 5, 2015Parks Canada
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Archived · expired 11 years ago

Avalanche danger

Sat
Sun
Alpine
2 · Moderate
Treeline
1 · Low
Below
1 · Low
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Highlights

Cooling has established supportive crusts to treeline. West winds have quickly created windslabs with small amounts of recent snow. Solar heating will be a factor.

Avalanche problems

  • Wind Slabs

    • Alpine
    • Treeline
    • Below treeline
    Likelihood
    Possible
    Size
    1–2
    Soft slabs up to 30cm deep have formed over the crusts with the recent snow. Although thin in many areas, there are some significant slabs that have grown along the ridge crests.

  • Cornices

    • Alpine
    • Treeline
    • Below treeline
    Likelihood
    Possible
    Size
    1–2
    The recent growth that has developed on the cornices is quite fragile. With heating or continued wind this new growth may fail and would likely trigger windslabs on the loaded slopes below.

  • Loose Wet

    • Alpine
    • Treeline
    • Below treeline
    Likelihood
    Possible - Likely
    Size
    1–2
    Small amounts of snow above the crusts will fail easily with solar heating.

Weather Forecast

Friday will bring sunny breaks with light to moderate winds west winds and a freezing level of 1900m. Saturday should be much the same with a freezing level at 1800m. More cooling can be expected for Sunday and Monday with flurries producing up to 15cm of snow.

Snowpack Summary

The entire snowpack was moist BTL and to ridgelines on solar aspects while on shaded aspects the top meter of snow was moist to treeline. With cooling over the last two days a solid crust has formed as the top 10 to 30cm has refrozen in these areas. A thin rain crust exists as high as 2400m on the shaded aspects. 5cm of new snow sits on all of this

Avalanche Summary

With the cooling over the last two days, slab activity has diminished however today loose moist activity was occurring with solar heating and loose dry activity could be seen on the shaded aspects as the new snow failed over the surface crusts to size 1.

Confidence

Regions covered